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Columbia  ^nibersitp 
intfteCitpofiaetDgorfe 


LIBRARY 


ESSAYS  AND  REVIEWS 


CHIEFLY   ON 


THEOLOGY,  POLITICS,  AND  SOCIALISM, 


BT 


6;"1^  BROWNS  ON,  'l.l.  d. 


NEW  YORK: 
D.  &  J.  SADLIER  &  Co.    31  BARCLAY   STREET. 

boston: — 128    FEDERAL-STREET. 

MONTREAL,    C.     E: 

CORNER  OF  ST.  FRANCIS  XAVIER  AND  NOTRE-DAMR  STREETS. 

1862 


/ 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress  in  the  year  185'i, 

BY  D.  &  J.  SADLIEE  &  CO. 

In  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  United  States,  for  the 

Southern  District  of  New  York. 


Stereotype d  by  "Vincent  L.  DiZiXt 

128  Tulton-street,  N.  Y. 


CONTENTS 


Page. 

Preface,           ..         ..         ..         ..         ..         ..         ..  v 

The  church  against  no-church,           1 

The  episcopal  observer  versus  the  church,       ..          ..  69 

Thurnwell's  answer  to  dr.  lynch,  (April,  1848.)     ..  100 

Thornwell's  answer  to  dr.  lynch,  (October,  1848.)        ..  168 

Protestantism  ends  in  transcendentalism,    ..         ..  209 

Protestantism  in  a  nutshell,         ..         ..         ..         ..  234 

Authority  and  liberty,             ..         --         .-         -.  262 

Political  constitutions,        ..         ..         ..         ..         --  293 

War  and  loyalty,            ..         , 321 

The  higher  law,        349 

Catholicity  necessary  to  sustain  popular  liberty,  368 

'   Legitimacy  and  revolutionism,        ..         ..          ..         ..  386 

Native  Americanism,         420 

Labor  and  association,           444 

Socialism  and  the  church         479 


70727 


PREFACE. 

The  following  essays  and  reviews  are  republished 
from  Brownson^s  Quarterly  Review.  They  have  been 
subjected  to  a  rigid  re\'ision5  but  are  reproduced  as 
originally  published,  excepting  a  few  verbal  corrections, 
the  suppression  of  a  few  superfluous  sentences,  and  the 
omission  of  some  paragraphs  which  have  lost  their 
interest. 

It  is  very  possible  that  in  selecting  these  articles 
for  republication,  I  have  not  chosen  those  which  the 
student  of  theology  or  philosophy  would  have  recom- 
mended, nor  even  those  which  I  myself  regard  as  the 
least  unworthy  of  my  writings  during  the  past  seven 
or  eight  years  ;  but  essays  of  a  somewhat  abstruse  and 
metaphysical  nature,  though  they  may  be  tolerated  in 
a  periodical  where  they  appear  along  with  others  of  a 
less  unpopular  cast,  will  hardly  find  in  these  times  read- 
ers if  published  in  a  volume  by  themselves.  I  have 
selected  such  articles  as  have  seemed  to  me  best  adapted 
to  the  tastes  of  the  general  reader,  and  the  most  likely 
to  be  useful  to  the  public  at  large,  whether  Catholic  or 
Protestant. 

The  reader  must  not  expect  too  much  from  these 
articles,  and  must  be  content  to  take  them  for  what 
they  are, — simply  articles  originally  written  for  a  Quar- 
terly Review.  They  are  by  no  means  separate  and 
complete  treatises  on  the  several  topics  they  discuss. 
But,  if  read  in  connection,  in  the  order  in  which  I  have 
arranged  them,  they  may,  perhaps,  be  found  to  give  a 


PREFACE. 


tolerably  full  view  of  the  argument  for  the  Church  and 
against  Protestantism,  of  the  origin  and  constitution  of 
Government,  the  principles  of  Authority  and  Liberty, 
the  sacredness  of  Law,  the  duty  of  Loyalty,  and  the 
madness  and  danger  of  modern  Socialism. 

If  any  one  looks  over  this  volume  for  something  new, 
original,  or  striking  he  will,  most  likely,  be  disappomted. 
I  have  not  labored  to  present  novel  or  startling  specula- 
tions on  theology,  philosophy,  ethics,  or  politics,  but 
simply  to  ascertain  the  principles  and  doctrines  of  the 
Church  of  God,  and  to  apply  them  to  the  great  practi- 
cal questions  of  the  day.  My  aim  has  been  to  bring 
up  anew  the  old  and  too  often  forgotten  truth,  not  to 
bring  out  a  novel  theory.  From  first  to  last  I  think 
and  write  as  a  man  many  centuries  behind  his  age. 

The  articles  before  being  printed  in  the  Quarterly 
Review  were  submitted  to  the  revision  of  a  competent 
theologian,  and  I  have  no  reason  to  suppose  that  they 
contain  anything  not  in  accordance  with  Catholic  faith 
and  morals  ;  but  they  are  as  a  matter  of  course  repub- 
lished with  submission  to  the  proper  authority,  and  I 
shall  be  most  happy  to  correct  any  error  of  any  sort 
they  may  contain  the  moment  it  is  brought  authorita- 
tively to  my  notice.  It  is  not  my  province  to  teach  ; 
all  that  I  am  free  to  do  is  to  reproduce  with  scrupu- 
lous fidelity  what  I  am  taught. 

Religion  is  for  me  the  supreme  law ;  it  governs  my 
politics,  not  my  politics  it.  I  never  suffer  myself  to 
inquire  whether  such  or  such  a  religion  favors  or  not 
such  or  such  a  political  order  ;  for  if  there  is  a  conflict 
the  political  must  yield  to  the  religious.  I  therefore 
have  not  labored  to  show  that  the  Church  is  favorable  or 
unfavorable  to  monarchy,  to  aristocracy,  or  to  democ- 
racy.     I   do   not  find   that  she   erects   any   particular 


PREFACE.  Vii 

form  of  Government  into  an  article  of  faith, — the  mo- 
narchical no  more  than  the  democratic,  the  democratic 
no  more  than  the  monarchical.  Any  one  of  these  par- 
ticular forms  may  be  legal  government,  and  when  and 
where  it  is  the  good  Catholic  is  bound  to  support  it, 
and  forbidden  to  conspire  to  subvert  it.  The  republi- 
can order  is  the  legal  order  here,  and  I  owe  it  civil 
obedience.  I  am  the  citizen  of  a  republic,  and  there- 
fore a  republican  citizen ;  I  am  a  Catholic,  therefore  a 
loyal  citizen,  and  no  radical  or  revolutionist,  either  for 
my  own  country  or  any  other. 

My  Catholic  friends,  who  have  been  frequently  dis- 
turbed by  hearing  it  alleged  that  Catholicity  is  anti- 
republican  and  incompatible  with  popular  institutions, 
will  find  no  direct  attempt  to  refute  so  silly,  nay,  so 
absurd  an  objection.  I  respect  my  religion,  and  even 
the  great  body  of  my  own  countrymen,  too  much  to 
undertake  to  do  that.  But  they  will  find  that  I  have 
attempted,  not  unsuccessfully  perhaps,  to  prove  that 
without  the  Catholic  religion  it  is  impossible  permanently 
to  sustain  popular  institutions,  or  to  secure  their  free 
and  salutary  operations.  Indeed  no  form  of  govern- 
ment can  be  secure  or  operate  well  without  the  Church. 
Without  Catholicity  you  can  have,  in  principle  at  least, 
only  despotism  or  anarchy.  All  that  our  countrymen 
find  in  our  institutions  has  been  adopted  from  England, 
and  inherited  from  Catholic  ancestors. 

I  seldom  throw  a  sop  to  Cerberus.  I  have  made 
no  attempt  to  propitiate  popular  opinion  by  pandering 
to  popular  prejudice.  I  was  not  born  to  be  a  courtier, 
either  of  king  or  people.  I  seek  to  enlighten  public 
opinion,  not  to  echo  it ;  and  I  always  say,  in  a  plain, 
straight  forward  way,  what  I  am  convinced  ought  to  be 
said,  leaving  popularity  or  unpopularity  to  look  out  for 


PREFACE. 


itself.  But  if  my  language  is  free,  bold,  and  some- 
times severe,  I  would  fain  hope  that  it  is  never  incon- 
siderate, rash,  or  gratuitously  offensive. 

I  shall  be  found  to  have  seldom  indulged  in  frothy 
declamations  about  liberty,  the  rights  of  man,  and  the 
dignity  of  human  nature.  There  are  enough  others  to 
do  that.  I  assert  my  liberty  in  my  practice  ;  I  exer- 
cise my  rights  as  a  man,  and  I  aim  to  show  my  respect 
for  the  dignity  of  human  nature  in  my  deportment. 
Liberty  is,  no  doubt,  threatened  in  this  country,  but 
the  danger  comes  chiefly  from  the  side  of  license,  and 
is  best  averted,  not  by  common  place  declamations  for 
the  largest  liberty,  but  by  asserting  and  maintaining 
the  supremacy  of  Law. 

I  have  shown  no  sympathy  with  the  various  classes 
of  fanatics  with  which  the  country  teems, — philanthro- 
pists, reformers,  as  they  call  themselves.  They  have 
become  as  troublesome  as  the  frogs  of  Egypt,  and  are 
far  more  dangerous.  They  strike  at  the  root  of  all  indi- 
vidual liberty  and  manly  independence  of  character, 
and  are  doing  their  best  to  revive  the  absurd  and  des- 
potic legislation  of  the  early  Colonial  times  of  New 
England.  ( Of  Christian  Charity,  that  supernatural  virtue 
which  loves  God  supremely  and  its  neighbor  as  itself 
for  God's  sake,  we  cannot  have  too  much ;  but  of  the 
whimpering  sentiment  of  philanthropy,  which  an  unbeliev- 
ing age  substitutes  for  it,  and  which  is  the  love  of  all 
men  in  general  and  the  hatred  of  every  man  in  par- 
ticular, unless  a  criminal,  we  cannot  have  too  little. 
Charity  redeems  the  world,  and  gives  us  a  heaven  on 
earth;  philanthropy  effects  no  good,  and  tramples  doAvn 
more  good  by  the  way  in  going  to  its  object,  than  it 
could  possibly  effect  in  accomplishing  it.  ) 

Whatever  the   imperfections  of  these  articles,  and 


PREFACE.  IX 

no  one  can  be  more  sensible  of  their  imperfections  than 
I  am,  there  is  this  to  be  said  in  their  favor,  that  they 
are    the    production    of   no    youthful    aspirant    seeking 
notoriety  by  paradox  and   excentricity,  nor  of  an  old 
man  soured  by  disappointment,  and  seeking  to  vent  his 
spite  upon  an  unoffending  world.     I  have  lived  in  the 
world,  and  shared  its  vicissitudes,  but  I  have  no  wrongs 
to  complain  of,   no  sense  of  injustice  rankling  in  my 
bosom.     I  have  no  mortified  ambition,  and  have  attain- 
ed to  more  than  in  the  most  ardent  dreams  of  my  youth 
I  ever  aspired  to.     I  am  contented  with  my  lot  in  the 
world,  and  have  no  desire  to  change  it.      Conviction, 
not  desperation,  led  me  into  the   Church,  and  I  have 
found  a  thousand  times  more  than  I  expected.      It  is 
true,  in  my  youth  and  early  manhood  I  held  and  pub- 
lished views  very  different  from  those  set  forth  in  this 
volume,  and  this  fact  will  have  its  weight  against  what- 
ever I  may  now  say.     But  it  is  no  crime  to  grow  wiser 
with   years,    and   to    profit   by   experience    or   by   the 
grace  of  God.     The  deliberate  convictions  of  a  man  of 
mature  age  are  worth  more  than  the  crude  speculations 
of  impetuous  and  inexperienced  youth.      But  there  is 
nothing  in  these  essays  and  reviews  that  rests  on  my 
personal  authority;  they  are  to  be  taken  for  what  they 
are  worth,  without  any  reference  to  the  much  or  little 
respect  due  to  their  author. 

Much  has  been  said  first  and  last  in  the  newspapers 
as  to  the  frequent  changes  I  have  undergone,  and  I  am 
usually  sneered  at  as  a  weathercock  in  religion  and 
politics.  This  seldom  disturbs  me,  for  I  happen  to 
know  that  most  of  the  changes  alleged  are  purely  im- 
aginary. I  was  born  in  a  Protestant  community,  of 
Protestant  parents,  and  was  brought  up,  so  far  as  I 
was  brought  up  at  all,  a  Presbyterian.     At  the  age  of 


PREFACE. 


twenty-one  I  passed  from  Prebyterianism  to  what  is 
sometimes  called  Liberal  Christianity,  to  which,  I  re- 
mained attached,  at  first  under  the  form  of  Universal- 
ism,  afterwards  under  that  of  Unitarianism,  till  the  age 
of  forty-one,  when  I  had  the  happiness  of  being  received 
into  the  Catholic  Church.  Here  is  the  sum  total  of 
my  religious  changes.  I  no  doubt  experienced  difiicul- 
ties  in  defending  the  doctrines  I  professed,  and  I  shifted 
my  ground  of  defence  more  than  once,  but  not  the  doc- 
trines themselves. 

I  was  during  many  years,  no  doubt,  a  radical  and 
a  socialist,  but  both  after  a  fashion  of  my  own.  I  held 
two  sets  of  principles,  the  one  set  the  same  that  I  hold 
now,  the  other  the  set  I  have  rejected.  I  supposed 
the  two  sets  could  be  held  consistently  together,  that 
there  must  be  some  way,  though  I  never  pretended  to 
be  able  to  discover  it,  of  reconciling  them  with  each 
other.  Fifteen  years'  trial  and  experience  convinced 
me  to  the  contrary,  and  that  I  must  choose  which  set 
I  would  retain,  and  which  cast  off.  My  natural  tend- 
ency was  always  to  conservatism,  and  democracy,  in 
the  sense  I  now  reject  it,  I  never  held.  In  politics,  I 
always  advocated,  as  I  advocate  now,  a  limited  govern- 
ment indeed,  but  a  strong  and  efficient  government. 
Here  is  the  sum  total  of  my  political  changes.  I  never 
acknowledged  allegiance  to  any  party.  From  1838  to 
1843,  I  acted  with  the  Democratic  party,  because  dur- 
ring  those  years  it  contended  for  the  public  policy  I 
approved ;  since  then  I  have  adhered  to  no  party.  No 
party  as  such  ever  had  any  right  to  count  on  me,  and 
most  likely  none  ever  will  have.  I  do  not  believe  in 
the  infallibility  of  political  parties,  and  I  always  did 
and  probably  always  shall  hold  myself  free  to  support 
the   men   and    measures   of  any    party,    or    to   oppose 


FREFACE.  X] 


them,  according  to  my  own  independent  convictions  of 
what  is  or  is  not  for  the  common  good  of  my 'country. 

But  after  all,  this  is  not  a  matter  worth  taking  any 
notice  of.  I  am  not  anxious  to  prove  that  I  have  al- 
ways acted  consistently,  and  have  never  changed  my 
opinions.  Charges  may  be  alleged  against  me  that  are 
not  true,  but  the  public  is  not  likely  to  believe  any- 
thing worse  of  my  life  before  I  became  a  Catholic  than  I 
do  myself.  I  was  a  Protestant,  and  had  the  virtues  and 
the  vices  of  Protestants,  and  probably  was  not  much 
better  nor  much  worse  than  the  average  of  my  class. 
I  was,  of  course,  all  unworthy  to  be  a  Catholic,  and 
in  myself  am  now  all  unworthy  of  the  confidence  of 
Catholics.  There  is  no  question  of  that ;  and  if  the 
truth  or  falsity  of  my  writings  depended  on  my  own 
merits  or  demerits,  they  would  deserve  not  a  moment's 
consideration.  I  have  referred  to  the  subject  only  as 
an  act  of  justice  to  my  Catholic  friends,  who  have  so 
generously  given  me  their  hearts.  But  I  certainly  had 
errors,  gross  and  inexcusable  errors,  and  I  beg  the 
public  to  accept  this  volume  as  a  slight  token  of  my 
sincere  repentance,  and  of  my  earnest  wish  to  do  all 
in  my  power  to  atone  for  them. 

I  respectfully  lay  this  humble  volume  at  the  feet 
of  the  Venerable  Prelates  and  Clergy  of  the  United 
States,  not  as  worthy  of  their  patronage,  or  even  of 
their  notice,  but  as  a  mark  of  filial  reverence  and  sub- 
mission, and  of  profound  and  lively  gratitude  for  their 
kind  encouragement,  and  generous  and  uniform  support 
of  my  humble  labors  in  the  cause  of  Catholic  truth. 

I  would  also  inscribe  it  to  my  Protestant  country- 
men. They  will  find  in  it  many  resons  why  I  have 
ceased  to  be  a  Protestant,  but  none  I  hope,  for  believ- 
ing that  I  have  lost  any  of  my  former  interest  in  them. 


Xll  PREFACE. 

or  that  their  welfare  here  or  hereafter  is  less  dear  to 
me  than  ever  it  was.  My  sympathies  with  my  fellow- 
men,  which,  perhaps,  are  livelier  and  deeper  than  some 
suppose,  have  been  quickened  and  expanded,  not  dead- 
ened and  contracted,  by  my  conversion  to  Catholicity. 
I  have  said  nothing  in  the  following  pages  in  wrath ; 
I  have  spoken  only  in  love. 

Placing  this  volume,  though  all  unworthy,  with  de- 
vout gratitude,  and  tender  love,  under  the  protection 
of  Our  Blessed  Lady,  as  I  do  myself  and  all  my  labors 
and  interests,  I  send  it  forth  to  the  public,  hoping  that 
it  may  contain  a  fit  word  fitly  spoken  for  some  earnest 
mind  struggling  to  emancipate  itself  from  error,  and  to 
burst  into  "  the  glorious  liberty  of  the  children  of  God." 

THE  AUTHOR. 

Mount  Bellingham, 

Maunday  Thursday,  1852. 


ESSAYS    AND    REVIEWS 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH* 


APRIL,     1845. 

The  Journal,  the  title  of  whicli  we  have  here  quoted,  is  the 
ably  conducted  organ  of  the  American  Unitarians.  As  a  peri- 
odical, it  is  one  in  which  we  take  no  shght  interest ;  for  it  is 
conducted  by  our  personal  friends,  and  through  its  pages,  which 
were  liberally  opened  to  us,  we  were  at  one  time  accustomed 
to  give  circulation  to  our  own  crude  speculations  and  pestilen- 
tial heresies.  We  introduce  it  to  our  readers,  however,  not 
for  the  purpose  of  expressing  any  general  opinion  of  its  charac- 
ter, or  the  peculiar  tenets  of  the  denomination  of  which  it  is  the 
organ  ;  but  solely  for  the  purpose  of  using  the  article  which  ap- 
peared in  the  January  nimiber,  headed  The  Church,  as  a  text 
for  some  remarks  in  defence  of  the  Church  against  No-Cliurch- 
ism,  or  the  doctrine  which  admits  the  Church  in  name,  but 
denies  it  in  fact,  so  prevalent  in  our  age  and  community. 

All  Protestant  sects,  just  in  proportion  as  they  depart  from 
Cathohc  unity,  tend  to  No-Churchism ;  and  the  Unitarians,  who 

•  The  Christian  Examiner  and  Religious  Miscellany,  January,  1845.— 
Art.  VI.    The  Church. 


2  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST   NO-CHURCH. 

are  the  Protestants  of  Protestants,  and  who  afford  ns  a  practical 
exemplification  of  what  Protestantism  is  and  must  be,  when  and 
wliere  it  has  the  sense,  the  honesty,  or  the  courage  to  be  con- 
sequent, have  aheady  reached  this  important  point.  They  can- 
not be  said,  in  the  proper  sense  of  the  word,  to  beheve  in  any 
church  at  all  They  see  clearly  enough,  that,  if  they  once  ad- 
mit a  church  at  all,  in  any  sense  in  which  it  is  distinguishable 
from  no-church,  they  can  neither  justify  the  Reformers  in  se- 
ceding from  the  Catholic  Church,  nor  themselves  in  remaining 
aliens  from  its  communion.  They  have,  therefore,  the  honesty 
and  boldness  to  deny  the  Church  altogether,  and  to  admit  in 
its  place  only  a  voluntary  association  of  individuals  for  pious  and 
religious  pui'poses ;  in  which  sense  it  is  on  a  par  with  a  Bible, 
IM^sionary,  Temperance,  or  Abolition  society,  with  scarcely  any- 
thing more  holy  in  its  objects,  or  more  binding  on  its  members 

The  Christian  Examiner^  in  the  article  we  have  referred  to 
fully  authorizes  this  statement ;  and  though  it  by  no  means  dis- 
cards the  sacred  name  of  Churchy  it  leaves  us  nothing  venerable 
or  worth  contending  for  to  be  signified  by  it.  The  controversies, 
for  the  next  few  year,  it  thinks,  will,  not  improbably,  revolve 
around  the  question  of  the  Church.  "  What,  then,"  it  asks,  "is 
the  Church  ?  what  is  its  authority  ?  what  its  importance  ?  what 
its  true  place  among  Christian  ideas  or  influences  ? "  These  are 
the  questions  ;  and  its  purpose  in  the  article  under  consideration 
is  to  oflfer  a  few  remarks  which  may  indicate  a  true  answer  to 
them,  especially  the  last. 

In  answer  to  the  question.  What  is  the  Church  ?  the  writer 
replies,  "  It  is  the  whole  company  of  believers,  the  uncounted 
and  wide-spread  congregation  of  all  those  who  receive  the  Gos- 
pel as  the  law  of  Ife.  It  is  coextensive  with  Christianity ;  it  is 
the  living  Christianity  of  the  time,  be  that  more  or  less,  be  it 
expressed  in  one  mode  of  worship  or  another,  in  one  or  another 
variety  of  internal  discipline.  The  Church  of  Christ  compre- 
hends and  is  composed  of  all  his  followers." — pp.  78,  '79. 

The  answer  to  the  question.  What  is  the  importance  of  the 
Church  ?  is  not  very  clearly  set  forth.     Perhaps  this  is  a  point 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  3 

on  which  the  writer  has  not  yet  obtained  clear  and  distinct 
views.  It  is,  probably,  one  of  those  points  on  which  "m.H-e 
light  is  to  break  forth."  The  ^^/ace  of  the  Church  amon^" 
Christian  ideas  and  influences  also  is  not  very  definitely  deter- 
mined ;  but  it  would  appear  that  the  sacred  writers  had  two 
ideas, — for  they  were  not,  like  our  modern  reformers,  men  of 
only  one  idea, — and  these  two  ideas  were,  one  the  Church,  the 
other  the  individual  soul.  We  do  not  mean  to  say  that  the 
writer  really  intends  to  teach  that  the  Church  is  an  idea,  for  a 
"company  of  believers"  can  hardly  be  called  an  idea,  nor  can 
the  individual  soul ;  but  he  probably  means  to  teach  that  the 
sacred  writers  had  two  ideas,  or  rather  two  points  of  view,  from 
w^hich  they  contemplated  this  company  of  believers, — the  one 
collective,  the  other  individual. 

"  They  loved  to  collect — in  idea — the  members  of  Christ,  as 
they  styled  them,  under  one  idea,  and  present  them  in  this  rela- 
tion of  unity  to  their  readers.  Thus  viewed,  the  Church  became 
the  emhlem  of  Christian  influences  and  Christian  benefits.  It 
•expressed  all  Christ  had  Uved  for,  or  died  for.  He  had  loved  it, 
and  gi\'en  himself  for  it.  It  was  '  the  pillar  and  ground  of  the 
truth.'  It  was  the  'body'  of  which  he  was  the  head." — p.  19. 
This  unity,  however,  is  purely  ideal ;  that  is,  imaginary.  The 
only  unity  really  existing  consists  merely  in  the  similar  senti- 
ments, hopes,  and  aims  of  the  individual  members.     But 

"  There  was  another  idea  rx\  which  the  Apostles  insisted  still 
more  strenuously,  that  of  the  individual  soul.  They  taught  the 
importance  of  the  individual  soul.  Around  this,  as  the  one  ob- 
ject of  interest,  were  gathered  the  revelations  and  command- 
ments of  the  Gospel.  Personal  responsibleness — in  view  of 
privileges,  duties,  sins,  temptations — was  their  great  theme. 
They  preached  the  Gospel  to  the  soul  in  its  indindual  exposure 
and  want.  It  is  the  pecuharity  of  our  religion,  its  vital  pecu- 
harity,  that  it  makes  the  individual  the  object  of  its  address,  its 
immediate  and  its  final  action.  Christianity  divested  of  this 
distinction  becomes  powerless,  and  void  of  meaning.  It  contra- 
dicts and  subverts  itself." — lb. 


4  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST   NO-CHURCH. 

Here,  then,  are  two  ideas, — 'the  idea  of  the  company^  and  the 
idea  of  the  individual ;  and  the  first  idea  is  to  be  held  subordi- 
nate to  the  second ;  which,  we  supj^ose,  means  that  the  end  of 
Christianity  is  the  redemption  and  sanctification  of  the  individ- 
ual soul,  and  that  the  Church  is  to  be  valued  only  in  so  far  as 
it  is  a  means  to  this  end, — a  doctrine  which  we  do  not  recol- 
lect to  have  ever  heard  questioned.  The  place  of  the  Church 
is,  therefore,  below  the  individual,  and  being  only  the  effect  of 
the  operation  of  Christianity  in  the  hearts  of  individuals,  as  the 
writer  tells  us  farther  on,  its  importance  must  consist  solely  in 
the  reaction  of  the  example  of  Christians  on  those  not  yet  con- 
verted, and  in  the  aid  and  encouragement  union  among  pro- 
fessed Christians  gives  to  one  another  in  their  strivings  after  the 
Christian  life.  This,  as  near  as  we  can  come  at  it,  is  the  Chris- 
tian Examiner's  doctrine. 

The  writer  throws  in  one  or  two  remarks,  in  connexion  with 
his  general  statement,  to  which  we  cannot  assent.  "  It  has  been 
maintained,"  he  says,  "  that  the  Church  is  the  principal  idea  in 
the  Gospel.  It  has  been  generally  supposed  that  the  individual 
exists  for  the  Church.  Ecclesiastical  writers  have  contended, 
and  the  people  have  admitted,  that  the  rights  of  the  Church 
were  stronger  than  the  rights  of  the  members,  that  the  pros- 
perity of  the  Church  must  be  secured  at  the  expense  of  the  be- 
liever's peace  and  independence ;  that,  in  a  word  everything 
must  be  made  to  yield  to  the  Church." — p.  80.  The  writer 
must  have  drawn  on  his  imagination  for  his  facts.  Ecclesiastical 
writers  have  never  contended,  nor  have  the  people  admitted, 
any  such  thing.  The  doctors  of  the  Church  have  always  and 
uniformly  taught  tliat  the  Church  exists  for  the  individual,  not 
the  individual  for  the  Church,  and  that  she  is  to  be  submitted 
to  solely  as  the  means  in  the  hands  of  God  of  redeeming  and 
sanctifying  the  individual  soul.  This  is  wherefore  Catholics  so 
earnestly  contend  for  the  Church,  so  willingly  obey  her  com- 
mands, and  so  cheerfully  lay  down  their  Hves  in  her  defence. 

The  question  of  a  conflict  of  rights  between  the  Church  and 
the  individual,  which  the  Christian  Examiner  regards  as  the 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  b 

great  question  of  the  age,  is  no  question  at  all ;  for  there  nevei 
is  and  never  can  be  a  conflict  of  rights.  It  has  ne\er  been  held 
by  any  one  of  any  authority  in  the  ecclesiastical  world,  that  the 
riffhts  of  the  Church  are  stronger  than  the  rights  of  the  mem- 
bers, and  that  the  rights  of  the  members  must  yield  to  those  of 
the  Church.  Rights  never  yield ;  claims  may  yield,  but  not 
rights.  Establish  the  fact  that  this  or  that  is  the  right  of  the 
member,  and  the  Church  both  respects  and  guaranties  it ;  but 
where  she  has  the  right  to  teach  and  command,  she  does  not 
come  in  conflict  with  individual  rights  by  demanding  submis- 
sion, for  there  the  individual  has  no  rights.  To  hold  him, 
within  the  pro\^nce  of  the  Church,  to  obedience,  is  only  holding 
him  to  obedience  to  the  rightful  authority.  When  the  law 
says  to  the  individual,  "  Thou  shalt  not  steal,"  it  in&inges  no 
right ;  because  the  individual  has  not,  and  never  ha-d,  any  right 
to  steal. 

But  passing  over  this,  we  may  say,  the  Christmn  Examiner 
holds,  that,  in  the  usual  sense  of  the  term,  our  blessed  Saviour 
founded  no  church ;  he  merely  taught  the  truth,  and,  by  his 
teaching,  life,  sufferings,  death,  and  resurrection,  deposited  in 
the  minds  and  hearts  of  men  certain  great  seminal  principles  of 
truth  and  goodness,  to  be  by  their  own  fi-ee  thought  and  affec- 
tions developed  and  matured.  The  Church  is  nothing  but  the 
mere  effect  of  the  development  and  grov.^h  of  these  principles. 
"  It  is  but  a  consequence "  of  the  effect  of  Christianity  upon 
those  who  are  "  separately  brought  under  its  influence."  These, 
taken  collectively,  are  the  Church.  These  organi2e  themselves 
in  one  way  or  another,  adopt  for  their  social  regulation  and  mu- 
tual progress  such  forms  of  worship  or  internal  discipline  as  are 
suggested  by  the  measure  of  Christian  truth  and  virtue  reahzed 
in  their  hearts.  This^  is  all  the  church  there  is.  If  you  ask, 
What  is  its  authority  ?  the  answer  is,  "  A  fiction,  a  fiction  which 
has  cheated  millions  and  ruined  multitudes,  but  a  fiction  still." 
— p.  83.  This,  in  brief,  is  the  church  theory  of  Liberal  Chris- 
tians, in  fact,  the  theory  virtually  adopted  by  the  great  body  of 


6  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

tlie  Protestant  world,  and  the  only  theory  a  consistent  Protestant 
can  adopt,  if  not  even  more  than  he  can  consistently  adopt. 

The  insufficiency  of  this  theory  it  is  our  purpose  in  the  fol- 
lowing essay  to  point  out,  by  showing  that  with  it  alone  it  is 
impossible  to  elicit  an  act  of  faith.  We  shall  begin  what  we 
have  to  offer  by  defining  what  it  is  we  mean  by  the  Church, 
and  what  are  the  precise  questions  at  issue  between  us  and 
No-Churchmen.  We  do  this,  because  the  Christian  Ex- 
aminer and  its  associates  do  not  seem  to  have  any  clear  or 
definite  notions  of  what  it  is  we  contend  for,  when  we  con- 
tend for  the  authority,  infiillibility,  and  indefectibility  of  the 
Church,  or  what  it  is  of  which  we  really  predicate  these  impor- 
tant attributes. 

The  word  church,  it  is  well  known,  is  used  in  a  variety  of 
senses.  The  Greek  ixxXr]ala,  ecclesia,  rendered  by  the  word 
church,  taken  in  a  general  w^ay,  means  an  assembly,  or  congre- 
gation, whether  good  or  bad,  for  one  purpose  or  another ;  but 
is  for  the  most  part  taken  in  the  Scriptures  and  the  Fathers  in  a 
good  sense,  for  the  Church  of  Christ.  The  Enghsh  word  church, 
said  to  be  derived  from  KiQiog  and  olxog,  the  Lord's  house 
w^ould  seem  to  designate  primarily  the  place  of  worship  ;  but  as 
oXxo(;^  like  our  English  word  house,  may  mean  the  family  as 
well  as  the  dwelling  or  habitation,  the  word  church  may  not  im- 
properly be  used  to  designate  the  Lord's  family,  the  worship- 
pers as  well  as  the  place  of  worship ;  in  which  sense  it  is  a  suf- 
ficiently accurate  translation  of  the  Greek  ixalriaia,  as  generally 
used  by  ecclesiastical  writers. 

1.  By  the  Church  we  understand,  then,  when  taken  in  its 
widest  sense,  wdthout  any  limitation  of  space  or  time,  the  whole 
of  the  Lord's  family,  the  whole  congregation  of  the  faithful, 
united  in  the  true  worship  of  God  under  Christ  the  head.  In 
this  sense  it  comprehends  the  faithful  of  the  Old  Testament, — 
not  only  those  belonging  to  the  Synagogue,  but  also  those  out; 
of  it,-  as  Job,  Melchisedech,  (fee, — the  blest,  even  the  angels,  in 
heaven,  the  suffering  in  purgatory,  and  those  on  the  way.     As 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  7 

comprehending  the  blest  in  heaven,  it  is  called  the  Church  Tri- 
umphant ;  the  souls  in  purgatory,  the  Church  Suffering ;  believ- 
ers on  the  way,  the  Church  Mihtant ;  not  that  these  are  three 
different  Churches,  but  different  parts,  or  rather  states,  of  one 
and  the  same  Church.  But  with  the  Church  in  this  compre- 
hensive sense  we  have  in  our  present  dscussion  nothing  to  do. 
The  question  obviously  turns  on  the  Church  Mihtant. 

2.  The  Church  Militant  is  defined  by  Catholic  writers  to  be 
"  The  society  of  the  faithful,  baptized  in  the  profession  of  the 
same  faith,  united  in  the  participation  of  the  same  sacraments, 
and  in  the  same  worship,  under  one  head,  Christ  in  heaven,  and 
his  Vicar,  the  Sovereign  Pontiff,  on  earth."  But  even  this  is  too 
comprehensive  for  our  present  purpose, — to  indicate  at  once  the 
precise  points  in  the  controversy  between  us  and  No-Church- 
men. 

3.  We  must  distinguish,  in  the  Church  Militant,  between  the 
Ecclesia  credens^  the  congregation  of  the  faithful,  and  the  Eccle- 
sia  docens,  or  congregation  of  pastors  and  teachers. 

The  Church,  as  the  simple  congTegation  of  believers,  taken 
exclusively  as  believers,  is  not  a  visible  organization,  nor  an  au- 
thoritative or  an  infallible  body.  On  this  point  we  have  no  con- 
troversy with  the  Christian  Examiner  ;  for  we  are  no  Congre- 
gation alists,  and  by  no  means  disposed  to  maintain  that  the  su- 
preme authority  in  the  Church,  under  Christ,  is  vested  in  the 
body  of  the  faithful.  The  authority  of  the  Church  in  this  sense 
we  cheerfully  admit  is  "  a  fiction,"  "  a  mischievous  fiction,"  as 
the  history  of  Protestantism  for  these  three  hundred  years  of 
its  existence  sufficiently  establishes. 

When  we  contend  for  the  Church  as  a  visible,  authoritative, 
infallible,  and  indefectible  body  or  corporation,  we  take  the  word 
church  in  a  restricted  sense,  to  mean  simply  the  body  of  pastors 
and  teachers,  or,  in  other  words,  the  bishops  in  communion 
with  their  chief  We  mean  what  Protestants  would,  perhaps, 
better  understand  by  the  word  ministry  than  by  the  word 
church, — although  this  word  ministry  is  far  from  being  exact, 
ab  it  designates  functions  rather  than  functionaries,  and,  when 


8  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

used  to  designate  fimctionaries,  includes  the  several  orders  of 
the  Christian  priesthood, — not  merely  the  bishops  or  pastors, 
who  alone,  according  to  the  Catholic  view,  constitute  the  Eccle- 
sia  docens.  Nevertheless,  to  avoid  the  confusion  the  word 
church  is  apt  to  generate  in  Protestant  minds,  we  shall  some- 
times use  it,  merely  premising  that  we  use  it  to  express  only  the 
body  of  pastors  and  teachers,  by  whom  we  understand  exclu- 
sively the  bishops,  in  communion  with  their  chief,  the  Pope. 

Now,  the  question  between  us  and  No-Churchmen  turns 
precisely  on  this  Ecclesia  docens.  Has  our  blessed  Saviour  es- 
tablished a  body  of  teachers  for  his  Church,  that  is,  for  the  con- 
gregation of  the  faithful  ?  Has  he  given  them  authority  to  teach 
and  govern  ?  Has  he  given  to  this  body  the  promise  of  infalli- 
bility and  indefectibility  ?  If  so,  which  of  the  pretended  Chris- 
tian ministries  now  extant  is  this  body  ?  These  are  the  questions 
between  us  and  No-Churchmen,  and  they  cover  the  whole 
ground  in  controversy.  There  is  now  no  mistaking  the  points 
to  be  discussed. 

I.  We  take  it  for  granted  that  the  writer  in  the  Christian 
Examiner  admits,  or  intends  to  admit,  the  divine  origin  and 
authority  of  the  Christian  religion,  and  that  the  name  of  Jesus 
is  the  only  name  "  given  under  heaven  among  men  whereby  we 
must  be  saved."  We  shall  take  it  for  granted  that  he  holds 
the  Christian  religion  to  be,  not  merely  preferable  to  all  other 
religions  or  pretended  religions,  but  the  only  true  religion  and 
way  of  salvation.  We  are  bound  to  do  so,  for  he  is  a  Doctor 
of  Divinity,  a  professedly  Christian  pastor  of  a  professedly  Chris- 
tian congregation,  and  it  would  be  discourteous  on  our  part  to 
reason  with  him  as  we  would  with  a  Jew,  Pagan,  Mahometan, 
or  Infidel.  We  are  bound  to  assume  that  he  holds,  or  at  least 
intends  to  hold,  that  the  Gospel  of  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  is  the 
only  law  of  life,  without  obedience  to  which  no  one  can  be 
saved ;  and,  since  he  makes  Christianity  and  the  Church  coex- 
tensive, that  out  of  the  pale  of  the  Church  as  he  defines  it^ 
there  is  no  salvation.     The  Church,  he  says,  comprehends  and 


THE    CHUKCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  9 

is  composed  of  all  the  followers  of  Christ.  No  one,  then,  who 
is  not  in  the  Church  is  a  follower  of  Christ.  If  the  Gospel  of 
Christ  be  the  only  law  of  life,  no  one  not  a  follower  of  Christ 
can  be  saved.  Consequently,  no  one  not  a  member  of  the 
Church  of  Christ  can  be  saved. 

To  deny  this  is  to  reject  Christianity  altogether,  or  to  fall  into 
complete  indifferency.  If  men  can  be  saved,  or  be  acceptable  to 
their  Maker,  in  one  religion  as  well  as  in  another,  wherein  is  one 
preferable  to  another  ?  If  the  Christian  revelation  was  not 
necessary  to  our  salvation,  why  was  it  given  us,  and  why  are 
we  called  upon  to  believe  and  obey  it  ?  why  did  God  send  his 
only  begotten  Son  to  make  it,  and  why  was  it  declared  to  be 
of  such  inestimable  value  to  us  ?  If  Jesus  Christ  taught  that 
salvation  is  attainable  in  all  religions,  or  in  any  religion  but  his 
own,  why  were  the  Apostles  so  enraptured  with  the  Gospel,  and 
why  did  they  make  such  painful  sacrifices  for  its  promulgation  ? 
If  they  had  not  been  taught  to  regard  it  as  the  only  way  of  sal- 
vation, their  conduct  is  unaccountable  ;  and  if  it  be  not  the  only 
way  of  salvation,  they  and  their  Master  can  be  regarded  only  as 
a  company  of  deluded  fanatics,  whose  labors,  sacrifices,  and  cruel 
deaths  may  indeed  excite  our  pit}'^,  but  cannot  command  our 
respect.  We  shall  presume  the  writer  in  the  Christian  Ex- 
aminer sees  all  this  as  well  as  we,  and  therefore  shall  presume 
that  he  holds  with  us,  that  all  mankind  are  bound  to  worship 
God,  that  there  is  but  one  true  way  of  worshipping  God,  and 
therefore  but  one  true  religion,  and  that  this  true  religion  is  the 
Christian  religion.  He  who  does  not  admit  this  much  can 
by  no  allowable  stretch  of  courtesy  be  called  a  Christian.  This 
premised,  we  proceed. 

In  order  to  be  saved,  to  enter  into  fife,  or  to  become  ac- 
ceptable to  God,  one  must  be  a  Christian.  To  be  a  Christian, 
one  must  be  a  believer.  No  one  is  a  Christian  who  is  not  a 
follower  of  Christ.  Every  follower  of  Christ,  according  to  the 
Christian  Examiner,  is  a  member  of  the  Church  of  Christ. 
But,  according  to  the  same  authority,  the  Church  is  a  company 
of  believers.     Therefore  a  Christian  must  be  a   believer.     He 


10  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

who  is  a  believer  is  a  believer  because  lie  believes  something. 
Therefore,  in  order  to  be  a  Christian,  it  is  necessary  to  believe 
something. 

The  Christian  Examiner  must  admit  this  conclusion;  yet 
some  Unitarians  have  the  appearance  of  denying  it.  A  short 
time  since,  we  read  an  article  in  -a  Unitarian  newspaper,  writ- 
ten by  a  distinguished  Unitarian  clergyman,  in  which  the  writer 
maintains,  that,  although  faith  is  indispensable  to  the  Christian 
character,  belief  is  not ;  yet  he  fails  to  define  what  that  faith  is 
which  excludes  or  does  not  include  belief.  The  late  Dr.  Chan- 
nino-,  in  his  Discourse  on  the  Church,  objects  to  all  forms, 
creeds,  and  churches,  and  declares  that  the  essence  of  all  religion 
is  in  supreme  love  to  God  and  universal  justice  and  charity 
towards  our  neighbour.  Yet  we  presume  he  wishes  this  fact,  to 
wit,  that  this  is  the  essence  of  all  religion,  should  be  assented  to 
both  by  the  will  and  the  understanding.  But  this  is  not  a  fact 
of  science,  evident  in  and  of  itself.  It  depends  on  other  facts 
which  are  matters  of  belief,  and  therefore  must  itself  be  an  object 
of  belief.  Not  a  few  Unitarian  clergymen  of  our  acquaintance 
understand  by  faith  triLst  or  confidence  {fiducia),  and  contend, 
that,  when  we  are  commanded  to  believe  in  Christ,  in  God,  (fee, 
the  meaning  is,  that  we  should  trust  or  confide  in  him.  To  be- 
lieve in  the  Son  is  to  confide  in  him  as  the  Son  of  God.  But  I 
cannot  confide  in  him  as  the  Son  of  God,  unless  I  beheve  that 
he  is  the  Son  of  God ;  I  cannot  confide  in  God,  unless  I  believe 
that  he  is,  and  that  he  is  the  protector  of  them  that  trust  him. 
AVhere  there  is  no  belief,  there  is  and  can  be  no  confidence. 
Confidence  always  presupposes  faith  ;  for  where  there  is  no  be- 
lief that  the  trust  reposed  will  be  responded  to,  there  is  no 
trust ;  and  the  fact,  that  the  one  trusted  will  preserve  and  not 
betray  the  trust,  is  necessarily  a  matter  of  faith,  of  belief,  not 
of  knowledge.  Faith  begets  confidence,  but  is  not  it;  confi- 
dence is  the  effect  or  concomitant  of  faith,  but  can  never  exist 
without  it.  So,  however  these  may  seem  to  deny  the  necessity 
of  belief,  they  all  in  reality  imply  it,  presuppose  it. 

Moreover,  all  Unitarians  hold,  that,  to  be  a  Christian,  one 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  11 

must  be  a  follower  of  Christ.  Their  radical  conception  of  Christ 
is  that  of  a  teacher,  of  a  person  specially  raised  up  and  commis- 
sioned by  Almighty  God  to  teach,  and  to  teach  the  truth.  But 
one  cannot  be  said  to  be  the  follower  of  a  teacher,  unless  he 
believes  what  the  teacher  teaches.  Therefore,  to  be  a  Christian, 
one  must  be  a  believer. 

This,  again,  is  evident  from  the  Holy  Scriptures.  "  For 
without  faith,"  says  the  blessed  Apostle  Paul,  "  it  is  impossible 
to  please  God."  Heb.  xi.  6.  So  our  blessed  Saviour :  "  He 
that  believeth  and  is  baptized  shall  be  saved ;  but  he  that  be- 
lieveth  not  shall  be  condemned."  St.  Mark,  xvi.  16.  "  He  that 
believeth  in  the  Son  hath  eternal  life  ;  but  he  that  beUeveth  not 
the  Son  shall  not  see  hfe ;  but  the  wrath  of  God  abideth  on 
him."  St.  John,  iii.  36.  This  is  sufl&cient  to  establish  our  fii'st 
position,  namely,  that,  in  order  to  be  a  Christian,  it  is  necessary 
to  be  a  believer,  that  is,  to  beheve  somewhat. 

This  somewhat^  which  it  is  necessary  to  believe,  is  not 
falsehood,  but  truth.  What  we  are  required  to  believe  is  that 
for  not  believing  which  we  shall  be  condemned.  But  God  is  a 
God  of  truth,  nay,  truth  itself,  and  it  is  repugnant  to  reason  to 
assume  that  he  will  condemn  us  for  not  believing  falsehood. 
The  belief  demanded  is  also  essential  to  our  salvation ;  for  it  is 
said,  "  He  that  believeth  not  shall  be  condemned."  But  it  is 
equally  repugnant  to  reason  to  maintain  that  a  God  of  truth, 
who  is  truth,  can  make  belief  in  falsehood  essential  to  salvation. 
Therefore  the  belief  demanded,  as  to  its  object,  is  truth,  not 
falsehood. 

The  truth  we  are  required  to  believe  is  the  revelation 
which  Almighty  God  has  made  us  through  his  Son,  Jesus 
Christ,  or  in  other  words,  the  truth  which  Jesus  Christ  taught 
or  revealed.  The  belief  in  question  is  Christian  belief,  that 
which  makes  one  a  Christian  believer,  a  follower  of  Jesus,  a 
member  of  the  "  uncounted  and  wide-spread  congregation  of  all 
those  who  receive  the  Gospel  as  the  law  of  Hfe."  But  one  can 
be  a  Christian  believer  only  by  belie^^ng  Christian  truth  ;  and 
Christian  truth  can  be  no  other  truth,  if  different  truths  there  be, 


12  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST   NO-CHURCH. 

than  that  taught  by  Jesus  Christ.  Jesus  Christ,  according  to 
the  confession  of  Unitarians  themselves,  was  a  teacher  of  truth, 
and  a  teacher  of  nothing  but  truth.  Then  all  he  taught  was 
truth.  Therefore,  to  be  truly  a  Christian  believer,  truly  a  fol- 
lower of  Christ,  it  is  necessary  to  beheve,  explicitly  or  implicitly, 
all  the  truth  he  taught.  Hence,  the  commission  to  the  Apos- 
tles was  to  teach  all  nations,  and  to  teach  them  to  observe  all 
things  ivhatsoever  their  Master  had  commanded  them.  St.  Matt, 
xxviii.  20. 

The  truth  which  Jesus  Christ  taught  or  revealed  apper- 
tains, in  part,  at  least,  to  the  supernatural  order.  By  the  su- 
pernatural order  we  understand  the  order  above  nature,  that  is, 
above  the  order  of  creation.  All  creatures,  whether  brute  matter, 
vegetables,  animals,  men,  or  angels,  are  in  God,  and  without 
him  could  neither  be,  live,  nor  move.  But  God  has  created 
them  all  "  after  their  kinds,"  and  eacli  with  a  specific  nature. 
What  is  included  in  this  nature,  or  promised  by  it,  although 
having  its  origin  and  first  motion  in  God,  is  what  is  meant  by 
natural.  Supernatural  is  something  above^this,  and  superadded. 
God  transcends  nature,  and  is  supernatural ;  but  regarded  solely 
as  the  author,  upholder,  and  governor  of  nature,  he  is  natural, 
and  hence  the  knowledge  of  him  as  such  is  always  termed 
natural  theology.  But  as  the  author  of  gi-ace,  he  is  strictly 
supernatural ;  because  grace,  though  having  the  same  origin,  is 
above  the  order  of  creation,  is  not  included  in  it,  nor  promised 
by  it.  It  is,  so  to  speak,  an  excess  of  the  Divine  Fulness  not  ex- 
hausted in  creation,  but  reserved  to  be  superadded  to  it  accord- 
ing to  the  Divine  will  and  pleasure.  Thus  God  may  be  said 
to  be  both  natural  and  supernatural.  As  natural,  that  is,  as  the 
author,  sustainer,  and  governor  of  nature,  he  is  naturally  intelli- 
gible, according  to  what  Saint  Paul  tells  us,  Rom.  i.  20.  Invis- 
ihilia  enim  ipsius,  a  creatura  mundi,  per  ea  qucB  facta  sunt 
intellecta,  conspiciuiitur ;  semjnterna  quoque  ejus  virtus^  et 
divinitas  :  "  For  the  invisible  things  of  God,  even  his  eternal 
power  and  divinity,  from  the  creation  of  the  world,  are  clearly 
seen,  being  understood  by  the  things  that  are  made."     But  as 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  13 

supernatural,  that  is,  as  the  author  of  gi'ace,  he  is  not  naturally 
intelligible,  and  can  be  known  only  as  supernatural ly  revealed. 
The  fact  that  he  is  the  author  of  grace,  or  that  there  is  grace, 
is  not  a  fact  of  natural  reason,  or  intrinsically  evident  to  natural 
reason.  It,  therefore,  is  not  and  cannot  be  a  matter  of  science, 
but  must  be  a  matter  of  faith.  Hence,  the  Apostle  says  again, 
Heb.  xi.  6,  Credere  enim,  oportet  accedentem  ad  Deum  quia  est, 
et  inquirentibus  se  remunerator  sit :  "  He  that  cometh  to  God 
must  believe  that  he  is,  and  that  he  is  a  rewarder  of  them  that 
seek  him."  That  he  is  as  author  of  nature,  we  know,  but  that 
he  is  as  author  of  grace,  or  that  he  is  a  rewarder  of  them  that 
seek  him,  we  believe. 

Now,  the  revelation  of  Jesus  Christ  is  preeminently  the  reve- 
lation of  God  as  the  author  and  dispenser  of  grace,  and  there- 
fore preeminently  the  revelation  of  the  supernatural.  "  The  law 
was  given  by  Moses,  but  grace  and  truth  by  Jesus  Christ."  St. 
John,  i.  IV.  Hence,  to  believe  the  truth  and  all  the  truth 
which  Jesus  Christ  taught  is  to  believe  truth  pertaining  to  the 
supernatural  order. 

Unitarians,  it  is  true,  eliminate  from  the  Gospel  a  great  part 
of  the  mysteries,  and  reduce  it,  so  to  speak,  to  a  mere  repub- 
lication of  the  law  of  nature ;  their  theology  is  in  the  main  na- 
tural theology ;  their  faith  in  God  is  in  him  as  the  author  of 
nature,  and  the  immortality  they  look  for  is  merely  a  natural 
immortality ;  but  the  sounder  part  of  them,  do,  nevertheless,  to 
some  extent,  admit  that  Jesus  Christ  revealed  truths  not  natu- 
rally intelligible,  and  which  pertain  to  the  supernatural  order. 
They  admit  that  the  Gospel  is  itself,  in  some  sense,  a  revelation 
of  gi-ace,  and  therefore  a  revelation  of  the  supernatural.  They 
also  admit  the  necesssity,  in  order  to  be  Christian  believers,  of 
believing  in  several  particular  things  which  pertain  to  the  super- 
natural order.  Among  these  we  may  instance  remission  of  sins, 
the  resurrection  of  the  dead,  and  final  beatitude,  or  the  heavenly 
reward.  We  are  not  aware  that  they  question  these ;  and  we 
are  sure  no  one  can  question  them  without  losing  all  right  to  the 
Christian  name.    But  these  all  pertain  to  the  supernatural  order. 


14  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

Remission  of  sin,  whatever  else  it  may  mean,  means  at  least, 
remission  of  the  penalty  which  God  has  annexed  to  transgres- 
sion. The  penalty  is  annexed  by  God  either  as  author  and 
sovereign  of  nature,  or  as  supernatural.  If  by  God  as  super- 
natural, the  penalty  must  itself  be  supernatural ;  and  therefore 
he  who  believes  in  its  remission  must  believe  in  the  superna- 
tural, for  no  man  can  believe  in  the  remission  of  a  penalty 
which  he  does  not  beheve  to  have  been  annexed.  If  God  an- 
nexes the  penalty  as  author  and  sovereign  of  nature,  its  remis- 
sion must  be  supernatural.  To  assume  that  the  order  of  nature 
remits  it,  is  to  assume  nature  to  be  in  contradiction  with  herself, 
or  to  deny  the  remission  by  denying  the  existence  of  any 
penalty  to  remit.  Where  the  remission  begins,  there  ends  the 
penalty.  If  the  remission  be  in  the  order  of  nature,  then  the 
order  of  nature  imposes  no  penalty  beyond  the  point  where  the 
remission  begins ;  and  then  there  is  no  remission,  for  nothing  is 
remitted.  To  say  that  God  as  author  and  sovereign  of  nature 
remits  what  in  the  same  character  he  imposes  is  to  assume  that 
he  imposes  no  penalty  that  goes  farther  than  the  commence- 
ment of  the  remission.  Then,  in  fact,  no  remission.  The  pen- 
alty, in  this  case,  would  be  exhausted,  not  remitted.  Remission, 
then,  must  be  by  God  as  supernatural,  not  as  natural ;  not  as 
author  and  sovereign  of  nature,  but  as  author  and  dispenser  of 
grace.  Remission  is  necessarily  an  act  of  gi'ace,  and  therefore 
supernatural.  Then,  whatever,  view  be  taken  of  the  penalty 
itself,  he  who  believes  in  its  remission  must  believe  in  the  super- 
natural order. 

So  of  the  resurrection  of  the  dead.  We  do  not  mean  to  say 
that  by  natural  reason  we  cannot  demonstrate  a  future  continued 
existence,  but  that  a  fact  answering  to  the  term  resurrection  is 
naturally  neither  cognoscible  nor  demonstrable.  Resurrection 
means  rising  again,  and  evidently  pertains,  not  to  the  soul, 
which  never  dies,  but  to  the  body,  and  imphes  that  the  same 
body  which  died  is  raised ;  for  if  not,  it  would  not  be  a  re- 
surrection, but  a  simple  surrection,  or  perhaps  new  creation. 
Now,  by  no  natural  light  we  possess  can  we  come  to  the  know- 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  15 

ledge  of  the  fact  that  our  bodies  shall  rise  again.     Yet  we  are 
undeniably  taught  in  the  Gospel  that  such  is  the  fact. 

Moreover,  the  Apostle  Paul  tells  us  that  the  body  shall  not 
only  be  raised,  but  it  shall  be  raised  in  a  supernatural  condi- 
tion. "  It  is  sown  a  natural  body,  it  is  raised  a  spiritual  body." 
It  is  to  be  made  like  to  our  blessed  Saviour's  glorious  body. 
But  a  glorified  body  does  not  pertain  to  the  order  of  nature ; 
because  the  natural  body  it  is  said,  is  to  be  "  made  like  to  the 
body  of  his  glory,"  which  implies  that  it  must  be  changed 
from  its  natural  to  a  supernatural  condition,  before  it  is  a  glori- 
fied body.  But  by  what  natural  powers  we  possess  do  we  ar- 
rive at  the  fact  that  there  are  glorified  bodies,  much  more,  that 
our  vile  bodies  shall  be  changed  into  glorified  bodies  ?  And  by 
what  process  of  reasoning,  not  dependent  for  its  data  on  the 
revelation,  can  we,  now  we  are  told  it  shall  be  so,  prove  that  it 
will  be  so  ? 

So,  again,  as  to  our  final  destiny.  The  truth  we  are  to 
believe  pertains  to  the  supernatural  order.  St.  Peter  says,  "  By 
whom  (Jesus  Christ)  he  hath  given  us  very  great  and  precious 
promises,  that  by  these  you  may  be  made  partakers  of  the 
divine  nature," — efficiamini  divinice  consortes  naturoe,  2  Pet. 
i.  4.  That  this  is  to  partake  of  the  divine  nature  in  a  superna- 
tural sense,  and  not  in  the  sense  in  which  we  naturally  par- 
take of  it,  in  being  made  to  the  image  and  likeness  of  God,  is 
evident  from  the  fact  that  the  Apostle  calls  it  a  gift^  and  says  it 
is  that  which  is  promised.  What  pertains  to  nature  is  not  a 
gift,  and  what  is  already  possessed  cannot  be  said  to  be  some- 
thing promised.  Therefore  the  participation  of  the  divine  na- 
ture in  question  is  not  a  natural,  but  a  supernatural,  participa- 
tion. The  blessed  Apostle  John  tells  us,  "We  are  now  the 
sons  of  God,  and  it  hath  not  yet  appeared  what  we  shall  be. 
We  know  that  when  he  shall  appear  we  shall  be  like  him,  be- 
cause we  shall  see  him  as  he  is."  1  John  iii.  2.  Here  it  is  as- 
serted that  we  are  to  be  something  more  than  sons  of  God  in 
the  sense  we  now  are;  for  we  know  not,  even  being  sons  of 
God,  what  we  shall  be.     But  this  we  do  know,  that  when  he 


10  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

shall  appear  we  shall  be  like  him.  But  this  likeness  is  super- 
natural, not  that  to  which  we  were  created  ;  otherwise  it  would 
be  a  likeness  j^ossessed,  not  to  be  possessed.  How  by  the  light 
of  nature  learn  this  fact,  that  we  are  to  become  like  God,  par- 
takers of  the  divine  nature,  in  a  supernatural  sense  ?  Again, 
the  blessed  Apostle  in  the  same  passage  says,  "  We  shall  be 
like  him,  because  we  shall  see  him  as  he  is."  So  St.  Paul, 
1  Cor.  xiii.  12:"  Now  we  see  through  a  glass,  darkly,  but  then 
face  to  face  ;  now  I  know  in  part,  but  then  I  shall  know  even 
as  I  am  known."  The  fact  here  asserted,  to  wit,  that  our  future 
destiny  is  the  beatific  vision,  that  is,  to  see  God  as  he  is,  and  to 
know  hira  even  as  we  ourselves  are  known,  is  not  naturally  in- 
telligible, nor  demonstrable  by  natural  reason.  Moreover,  to 
see  God  as  he  is  exceeds  our  nature ;  for  naturally  we  cannot 
see  God  as  he  is,  that  is,  as  he  is  in  himself.  The  destiny, 
then,  which  the  Gospel  reveals  for  them  that  love  the  Lord  is 
supernatural.  For  "  It  is  written.  The  eye  hath  not  seen,  ear 
heard,  neither  hath  it  entered  into  the  heart  of  man,  what 
things  God  hath  prepared  for  them  that  love  him."  1  Cor.  ii.  9. 
Therefore,  to  believe  the  Gospel,  or  the  truth  which  Jesus  Christ 
taught,  it  is  necessary  to  believe  not  only  truth  supernaturally 
communicated,  but  truth  pertaining  to  the  supernatural  order. 
But  we  have  already  proved  that  it  is  necessary  to  salvation  to 
believe  the  truth  and  all  the  truth  which  Jesus  taught.  There- 
fore it  is  necessary  to  believe  truth  which  pertains  to  the  super- 
natural order. 

The  result  thus  far  is,  that,  in  order  to  be  Christians,  to  bo 
saved,  to  enter  into  life,  to  secure  the  rewards  of  heaven,  it  is 
necessary  to  believe  the  truth  which  Jesus  Christ  taught,  and 
that  we  cannot  believe  this  without  believing  in  that  which  is 
supernatural,  and  supernatural  both  as  to  the  mode  of  commu- 
nication and  as  to  the  matter  communicated.  The  truth  which 
Jesus  Christ  taught  is,  in  general  terms,  the  Gospel,  or  Chris- 
tian revelation;  and  the  Christian  revelation  is  a  supernatural 
revelation,  and,  in  part  at  least,  a  revelation  of  the  supernatural. 
This  revelation  and  its  contents  we  must  believe,  or  resign  our 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST   NO-CHURCH.  lY 

pretensions  to  the  Christian  name.  To  beheve  this  revelation 
and  its  contents  is  not,  we  admit,  all  that  is  requisite  to  the 
Christian  character — far  from  it ;  for  there  remain  beside,  faith, 
hope  and  charity,  and  the  greatest  is  charity.  Moreover,  faith 
alone  is  insufficient  to  justify  us  in  the  sight  of  God ;  for  fiiitli 
without  works  is  dead,  and  therefore  inoperative.  Nevertheless, 
faith  is  indispensable.  "  For  without  faith  it  is  impossible  to 
please  God,"  and  "  He  that  believeth  not  shall  be  condemned." 
This  much  we  conceive  we  have  established ;  and  this  much, 
we  presume,  the  Christian  Examiiier  will  concede. 

11.  Faith  or  belief,  as  distinguished  from  knowledge  and 
science,  rests  on  authority  extrinsic  both  to  the  believer  and  the 
matter  believed.  In  it  there  is  always  assent  to  something  pro- 
posed ah  extra.  That  the  sun  is  now  shining,  I  know  by  my 
own  senses ;  it  is  therefore  a  fact  of  knowledge ;  that  the  three 
angles  of  a  triangle  are  equal  to  two  right  angles,  which  I  know 
not  intuitively,  but  discursively,  is  a  fact  of  science.  The  first  I 
know  immediately  ;  the  second  I  can  demonstrate  from  what  it 
contains  in  itself.  But  in  behef  the  case  is  difierent.  The 
matter  assented  to  is  neither  intuitively  certain,  nor  intrinsically 
evident.  I  am  told  there  is  such  a  city  as  Rome,  which  I  have 
never  seen.  Ha\'ing  myself  never  seen  Rome,  I  have  no  intui- 
tive evidence  that  there  is  such  a  city.  The  proposition  that 
there  is  such  a  city  is  not  intrinsically  evident, — contains  nothing 
in  itself  from  which  I  can  demonstrate  its  truth.  Its  truth,  then, 
can  be  established  to  me  only  by  evidence  extrinsic  both  to  my- 
self and  to  the  proposition,  that  is,  by  testimony.  That  there 
is  a  God  is  a  fact  of  knowledge ;  for  if  it  be  said  that  we  do 
not  know  it  intuitively,  we  know  it  at  least  discursively,  since 
from  the  creation  of  the  world,  even  the  invisible  things  of  God 
are  clearly  seen,  being  understood  by  the  things  that  are 
made,  as  says  St.  Paul,  Rom.  i.  20.  But  that  God  has  des- 
tined them  that  love  him  to  the  beatific  vision  is  not  a  fact  of 
knowledge,  or  of  science ;  for  it  is  neither  intuitively  certain, 
nor  internally  demonstrable.     It  may  be  true  ;  but  whether  so 

2* 


Ig  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

or  not  can  be  determined  only  by  testimony,  that  is,  evidence 
extrinsic  both  to  the  proposition   and  to  myself.      Hence  St. 
Paul  says,  Heb.  xi.  1,  "Faith  is  the  substance  of  things  hoped 
for,  the  evidence  of  things  that  appear  not ; "  and  St.  Augus- 
tine, "  Faith  is  to  beUeve  what  you  see  not."— Tract  40  in  Joan. 
There  may  be  matters   contained  in   the  Christian   revela- 
tion which  are  matters  of  knowledge  or  of  science,  but  we  are 
concerned  with  it  now  only  so  far  as  it  is  a  matter  of  faith.     As 
a  matter  of  faith,  its  truth  rests  solely  on  extrinsic  evidence,  or 
testimony.     We  cannot,  then,  as  reasonable  beings,  beUeve  it, 
unless  we  have  some  extrinsic  authority  competent  to  vouch  for 
its  truth,  or  some  witness  whose  testimony  is  credible.     But  as 
an  object  of  faith,  the  Christian  revelation,  in  part  at  least,  is  a 
revelation  of  the  supernatural.     Now,  this  which  is  supernatural 
cannot  be  adequately  witnessed  to  or  vouched  for  by  any  natu- 
ral witness  or  authority.     No  witness  is  competent  to  testify  to 
that  which  he  does  not  or  cannot  himself  know,  either  intui- 
tively or  discursively.     But  no  natural  being,  how  high  so  ever 
in  the  scale  of  being  he  may  be  exalted,  can  know  either  intui- 
tively or  discursively  the  truth  of  that  which,  as  to  its  matter,  is 
supernatural.     The  only  adequate  authority  for  the  supernatu- 
ral is  the  supernatural  itself,  that  is,  God.     For  though  angels 
oi-  divinely  inspired  men  may  declare  the  supernatural  to  us, 
yet  they  themselves  are  not  witnesses  to  its  intrinsic  truth,  and 
have  no  ground  for  believing  its  truth  but  the  veracity  of  God 
revealino-  it  to  them.     They  may  be  competent  witnesses  to  the 
fact  of  the  revelation,  but  not  to  the  truth  of  the  matter  revealed. 
The  authority  or  ground  for  beheving  the  supernatural  mat- 
ter revealed  is,  then,  the  veracity  of  God,  and  we  cannot  reason- 
ably or  prudently  believe  any  proposition  involving  the  super- 
natural on  other  authority.     We  have  no  sufficient  ground  for 
faith  in  such  matters,  unless  we  have  the  clear,  express,  testi- 
mony of  God  himself     But  the  testimony  of  God  is  sufficient 
for  any  proposition,  in  case  ive  have  it ;    because  enough  is 
clearly  seen  of  God,  from  the  creation  of  the  world,  being  un- 
derstood by  the  things  that  are  made,  to  establish  on  a  scientific 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  19 

basis  the  fact  that  he  can  neither  deceive  or  be  deceived ;  for 
we  can  demonstrate  scientifically,  from  principles  furnished  by 
the  light  of  natural  reason,  that  God  is  infinitely  wise  and  good, 
and  no  being  infinitely  wise  and  good  can  deceive  or  be  de- 
ceived. God  is  the  first  truth — prima  Veritas — in  being,  in 
knowing,  and  in  speaking,  and  therefore  whatever  he  declares 
to  be  true  must  necessarily  and  infallibly  be  true.  Nothing, 
then,  is  more  reasonable  than  to  believe  God  on  his  word  or 
simple  veracity ;  for  it  is  no  more  than  to  believe  that  infinite 
and  perfect  truth,  truth  itself,  cannot  lie.  Whatever  God  has 
revealed  must  be  true.  Even  the  Christian  Exminer  would 
admit  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  if  it  were  proved  to  be  a  doc- 
trine of  Divine  revelation.  The  witness,  ground,  or  authority 
for  belie\ing  the  supernatural  is  the  veracity  of  God,  and  this 
all  will  admit  to  be  sufi5cient,  if  we  have  it ;  and  none  will  ad- 
mit, if  they  understand  themselves,  that  a  lower  authority  is 
sufficient. 

But,  although  the  veracity  of  God  is  the  ground  or  author- 
ity on  which  -we  assent  to  the  matter  revealed,  yet  w^e  cannot 
believe  without  sufficient  evidence  of  the  fact  of  revelation,  or,  in 
other  Avords,  without  a  witness  competent  to  testify  to  the  fact 
that  God  has  actually  revealed  the  matter  in  question, — made 
the  particular  revelation  to  which  assent  is  demanded.  The 
Christian  Examiner  is  Unitarian,  but  it  will  tell  us  that  it  ouofht 
to  beheve  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity,  if  God  has  revealed  it. 
Yet  it  demands,  very  properly,  evidence  of  the  fact  that  God  has 
revealed  it  or  declared  its  truth.  Reasonable  or  a  well  grounded 
behef  in  the  supernatural,  then,  requires  two  witnesses,  two 
vouchei*s ;  one  to  the  truth  of  the  matter  revealed,  \vhich  is  the 
veracity  of  God  revealing  it ;  the  other  to  the  fact  of  the  revela- 
tion, or  that  the  matter  in  question  has  actually  been  divinely 
revealed. 

The  revelation  is  made  to  intelligent  beings,  and  must 
therefore  consist  in  intelligible  propositions.  We  do  not  mean 
that  the  truths  revealed  should  be  comprehensible;  for  every 
supernatural  truth,  as  to  its  matter,  must  be  wholly  incompre- 


so  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

hensible  to  natural  reason ;  but  that  the  propositions  to  be  be- 
Heved  must  be  intelHgible.     What  is  present  to  the  mind,  in 
believing  the  revelation,  are  these  propositions,  which  convey 
the  truth,  but  in  an  obscure  manner,  to  the  understanding.     If 
we  should  mistake  the  propositions  actually  contained  in  God's 
revelation,  or  substitute  others  therefor,  since  it  is  only  through 
tliem  that  we  arrive  at  the  matter  revealed,  we  should  not  be- 
lieve the  revelation  which  God  has  actually  made,  but  something 
else,  and  something  else  for  which  we  cannot  plead  the  veracity 
of  God,  and  therefore  something  for  which  we  have  no  solid 
ground  of  fiiith.     Suppose  you  adduce  a  book  which  you  say 
contains  the  revelation  God  has  made,  and  suppose  you  bring 
ample  vouchers  for  the  foct  that  it  really  does  contain  such 
revelation.     In  this  case  I  should  have  sufficient  ground  for  be- 
lieving the  book  to  contain  the  word  of  God ;  but  before  I  should 
beHeve  the  word  of  God  itself,  I  must  believe  the  contents  of  the 
book  in  their  genuine  sense.     I  must  have,  then,  some  authority, 
extrinsic  or  intrinsic,  competent  to  declare  what  is  this  genuine 
sense.     What  I  believe  is  what  is  present  to  my  mind  when  I 
beheve.     What  is  present  to  my  mind  is  the  interpretation  or 
meaning  I  give  to  God's  word.     If  this  interpretation  or  mean- 
ing be  not  the  (/enuine  setise,  I  do  not,  as  w^e  have  said,  believe 
God's  word,  but  something  else.     Faith  in  the  supernatural  re- 
quires, then,  in  addition  to  the  witness  that  vouches  for  the  fact 
that  God  has  made  the  revelation,  an  interpreter  competent  to 
declare  the  true  meaning  of  the  revelation. 

The  faith  we  are  required  to  have  is 'equally  required  of  all  men. 
It  is  said,  qui  non  credideret, — that  is,  any  one,  without  any 
limitation,  who  believeth  not,  shall  be  condemned.  Then  there 
must  be  no  limitation  of  the  essential  conditions  of  faith.  Then 
the  witness  for  the  faith,  and  the  interpreter  of  God's  word, 
must  be  present  in  all  nations,  and  subsist  through  all  ages, 
■ — Cathohc  in  space  and  time.  We  who  live  in  this  country  at 
the  present  day  need  them  just  as  much  and  in  the  same  sense 
as  the  Jews  did  in  the  age  of  the  Apostles. 

The  witness   to   the  fact   of  the  revelation,  and  the  inter- 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURDH.  21 

preter  of  the  word,  must  not  only  subsist  through  all  ages  and 
nations,  but  must  be  unmistakable  ;  and  unmistakable  not  only 
by  a  few  philosophers,  scholars,  and  men  of  parts  and  leisure,  but 
by  the  poor,  the  busy,  the  weak,  the  ignorant,  the  illiterate; 
for  all  these  are  equally  commanded  to  beheve,  and  have  a 
right  to  have  a  solid  gTound  of  behef,  which  they  cannot 
have  if  they  may,  with  ordinary  prudence,  mistake  the  true 
witnessand  interpreter,  and  call  in  a  false  witness  and  a  mis- 
interpreter. 

The  witness  and  interpreter  must  be  infallible;  for,  if  fal 
lible,  it  may  call  that  God's  word  which  is  not  his  word,  and 
assign  a  meaning  to  God's  word  itself  which  is  not  the  genuine 
meaning.  We  may,  then,  be  deceived,  and  think  we  are  be- 
lieving God's  word  when  we  are  not.  But  where  there  is  a  pos- 
sibility of  deception,  there  is  room  for  doubt,  and  where  there  is 
room  for  doubt,  there  is  no  faith ;  for  the  property  of  faith  is  to 
exclude  doubt.  The  Apostle  says,  "  I  know  in  whom  I  believe, 
and  am  certain,"  and  whoever  cannot  say  as  much  has  not  yet 
elicited  an  act  of  faith."  Faith  is  a  theological  \irtue,  which  con- 
sists in  believing,  exphcitly  or  implicitly,  all  the  truths  God  has 
revealed,  without  doubting,  on  the  veracity  of  God  alone.  It  re- 
quires absolute  certainty,  objective  as  well  as  subjective.  Where 
there  is  belief  without  sufficient  objective,  certainly  the  belief  is 
not  faith  but  mere  opinion  or  persuasion.  Mere  subjective  cer- 
tainty, that  is,  an  inward  persuasion,  even  though  it  should  ex- 
clude all  actual  doubt,  would  not  be  faith,  unless  warranted  by 
evidence  in  which  reason  can  detect  no  deficiency.  It  is  a  blind 
prejudice,  and  would  vanish  before  the  hght  of  intelhgence.  A 
man  may  fancy  that  his  head  is  set  on  wrong  side  before,  and 
be  so  firmly  persuaded  of  it  that  no  reasoning  can  convince  him 
to  the  contrary;  but  his  internal  persuasion  is  not  faith.  For 
faith  is  primarily,  though  not  exclusively,  an  act  of  the  under- 
standing, and  must  be  reasonable,  and  he  who  has  it  must  have 
a  solid  reason  to  assign  for  it.  The  man  has  not  faith,  if  he 
doubts,  or  may  reasonably  doubt;  and  he  may  reasonably 
doubt,  if  the  evidence  is  not  sufficient.     He  who  has  for  his  faith 


22  THE    CmjRCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

only  the  testimony  of  a  fallible  witness,  that  may  both  deceive 
and  be  deceived,  has  ahvays  a  reasonable  ground  for  doubt,  and 
consequently  no  solid  ground  for  faith.  If  he  reasons  at  all  on 
the  testimony,  if  he  opens  his  eyes  at  all  to  his  liability  to  be 
deceived,  he  cannot,  however  earnestly  he  may  try  to  believe, 
avoid  doubting.  Therefore,  since,  with  a  fallible  witness,  or  fal- 
lible interpreter,  we  can  never  be  sure  that  we  are  not  mistaken, 
it  necessarily  follows,  if  we  are  to  have  faith  at  all,  that  we  must 
have  a  witness  and  interpreter  that  cannot  err,  that  is,  infallible. 
We  sum  up  again  by  saying,  that  it  is  necessary  to  believe 
the  truth  Jesus  Christ  revealed,  or,  in  other  words,  the  Christian 
revelation ;  that  to  believe  this  is  to  believe  truths  which  pertain 
to  the  supernatural  order ;  and  that,  to  have  a  solid  ground  for 
believing  truths  pertaining  to  the  supernatural  order,  we  must 
have,  1.  The  word  or  veracity  of  God ;  2.  A  witness  to  the  fact 
of  revelation,  and  an  interpreter  of  the  genuine  sense  of  what 
God  has  revealed,  inftdhble  and  subsisting  through  all  ages  and 
nations,  and,  with  ordinary  prudence,  unmistakable  by  even  the 
simple  and  unlearned.  The  first  tlie  Christian  Examiner  will 
not  deny  us.     We  proceed  to  prove  the  second. 

III.  There  must  be  such  a  witness  and  interpreter,  or,  in  other 
words,  some  infallible  means  of  determining  what  is  the  word 
of  God,  because  God  has  made  behef  of  his  word  the  essential 
condition  of  salvation.  We  know  from  natural  theology,  that 
is,  from  what  is  evident  to  us  of  God  by  natural  reason,  that 
he  is,  that  he  is  just,  and  that  he  would  not  be  just,  should  he 
make  faith  the  essential  condition  of  salvation,  and  not  pro\ide 
the  necessary  conditions  of  faith.  He  has  made  faith  the  condi- 
tion of  salvation,  as  we  have  proved,  and  as  the  Christia7i 
Examiner  must  admit,  unless  it  chooses  to  deny  the  Christian 
revelation  altogether.  But  the  infallible  witness  and  interpreter 
alleged  is  a  necessary  condition  of  faith,  as  we  have  shown  from 
the  nature  of  faith  itself.  Therefore,  God,  since  he  is  just  and 
cannot  belie  himself,  has  provided  us  with  the  witness  and  inter- 
preter   required,  or,  what  is  the    same    thing,  some  infallible 


THE    CHURCH    VGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  23 

means  of  determining  what  is  the  word  he  commands  us  to 
believe. 

There  is,  then,  the  witness  and  intepreter  of  God's  word  in 
question.  Who  or  what  is  it  ?  To  this  question  four  answere 
may  be  returned:— :1.  Reason;  2.  The  Bible;  3.  Private  Illu- 
mination :  4.  The  Apostolic  Ministry,  or  the  Church  teaching. 

1.  Reason  may  be  taken  in  two  senses  : — 1.  The  intellective  fac- 
ulty, as  distinguished  from  the  sensitive  faculty ;  2.  The  discur- 
sive or  reasoning  faculty.  In  the  first  sense,  it  is  the  faculty  of 
knowing  intuitively,  and  is  the  principle  of  Tcnowledge,  in  distinc- 
tion from  what  is  technically  termed  science.  In  this  sense,  rea- 
son, in  order  to  answer  our  purpose,  to  serve  as  the  witness  and 
interpreter  proved  to  be  necessary,  must  be  able  either  to  know 
God  intuitively,  or  to  apprehend  intuitively  the  intrinsic  truth 
of  his  word.  Reason  must  see  God  face  to  face,  know  intuitively 
that  it  is  God  who  speaks  ;  or  it  cannot  testify,  on  its  own  know- 
ledge, to  the  fact  that  the  speaker  alleged  is  God.  But  reason 
cannot  see  God  thus  face  to  face.  We  have  and  can  have  no 
intuitive  knowledge  of  God  in  this  sense.  Reason  cannot  be 
the  witness  on  the  ground  of  its  intuitive  apprehension  of  God, 
nor  can  it  be  on  the  ground  of  its  intuitive  perception  or  appre- 
hension of  the  intrinsic  truth  of  the  matter  revealed.  Our  natu- 
ral reason  or  power  of  knowing  cannot  extend  beyond  the  bounds 
of  nature.  But  the  matter  revealed,  or  the  truths  to  be  believed? 
are  supernatural,  and  therefore  transcend  the  reach  of  the  natu- 
ral intellect.  If  the  natural  intellect  could  attain  to  them,  they 
would  be,  not  supernatural,  but  natural.  Moreover,  if  the  intrin- 
sic truth  of  the  revelation  could  be  apprehended,  intuitively 
known,  it  would  be,  not  a  matter  of  faith,  but  of  knowledge ;  for 
faith  is,  to  believe  what  is  not  seen,  argumentum  non  apjparen- 
tium.  Heb.  xi.  1.  But  it  is  a  matter  of  faith,  as  ah-eady  proved, 
and  therefore  not  of  knowledge.  Therefore  reason  cannot  appre- 
hend the  intrinsic  truth  of  the  revelation,  and  fi-om  the  intrinsic 
truth  know  it  to  have  been  divinely  revealed.  Therefore  reason, 
as  the  simple  intellective  faculty,  or  power  of  intuition,  cannot 
be  the  witness. 


24  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST   NO-CHURCH. 

Reason,  in  the  second  sense,  is  discursive,  the  subjective  prin- 
ciple of  science,  in  distinction  from  intuitive  knowledge, — the 
faculty  of  deducing  conclusions  from  given  premises.  If  the 
premises  are  true,  the  conclusions  are  valid.  But  reason  cannot 
furnish  its  own  premises.  They  must  be  given  it ;  hence,  they 
are  called  data.  These  data  must  be  furnished  either  by  intui- 
tion, or  by  faith.  But  in  the  case  before  us  tiiey  can  be  fur- 
nished by  neither  ; — not  by  intuition,  as  we  have  just  proved ; 
and  not  by  faith,  because  faith  is  the  matter  to  be  determined. 

Proof  by  reason,  in  the  sense  we  now  use  the  term,  is  called 
demonstration.  The  position  assumed,  when  it  is  alleged  that 
the  discursive  reason  is  the  witness  of  the  fact  of  revelation,  is, 
that  reason  can  find  in  the  internal  character  of  the  revelation 
itself,  or  what  purports  to  be  a  revelation,  the  data  from  which 
it  can  demonstrate  that  it  is  actually  the  word  of  God.  But 
this  is  possible  only  on  condition  that  reason,  independently  of 
all  revelation,  be  in  possession  of  so  perfect  a  knowledge  of  God 
as  to  be  able  to  say  a  priori  what  a  revelation  from  God  will 
and  necessarily  must  be.  But  this  is  inadmissible  ;  1.  Because 
it  would  imply  that  the  revelation  is  intrinsically  evident  to 
natural  reason,  and  therefore  that  it  is  an  object  of  science  and 
not  of  faith ;  and  2.  Because  the  revelation  is  of  God  as  super- 
natural, and  reason  can  know  God  as  supernatural,  only  through 
the  medium  of  supernatural  revelation  itself.  The  knowledge 
which  reason  has  of  God  prior  to  the  revelation  is  simply  what 
is  contained  in  natural  theology,  that  is,  knowledge  of  God  sim- 
ply as  author,  sustainer,  and  sovereign  of  nature.  From  this  it 
is,  indeed,  possible  to  obtain  data  from  which  we  may  conclude, 
within  certain  limits,  what  a  supernatural  revelation  cannot  be, 
but  not  what  it  must  be.  God,  whether  as  author  of  nature,  or 
as  author  and  dispenser  of  grace,  that  is,  as  natural  or  as  super- 
natural, intelligible  or  superintelligible,  is  one  and  the  same  being 
and  therefore  cannot  in  the  one  be  in  contradiction  to  what  he 
is  in  the  other.  If,  in  what  purports  to  be  a  revelation  from 
him,  we  find  that  which  contradicts  what  is  clearly  seen  of  him, 
from  the  creation   of  the  world,  through  the  things  that  are 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  25 

made,  we  have  the  right  to  pronounce  it,  a  priori  not  his  rev- 
elation. .  But  beyond  this  reason  cannot  go  ;  for  it  is  not  Uuv- 
ful  to  reason  from  nature  to  grace,  from  the  natural  to  the 
supernatural,  from  data  furnished  by  natural  science  to  super- 
natural revelation.  Reason,  then,  has  no  data  from  which  it 
can  conclude  what  is  the  revelation.  Therefore  it  cannot  be  the 
witness  demanded. 

Moreover,  if  reason  knew  enough  of  God,  independently  of 
the  supernatural  revelation,  to  be-able,  from  the  intrinsic  charac- 
ter of  the  revelation,  to  pronounce  on  its  genuineness,  not  only 
negatively,  but  affirmatively,  it  would  know  all  of  God  the  rev- 
elation itself  can  teach.  The  revelation  would  then  be  super- 
fluous,— in  fact,  no  revelation  at  all ;  and  the  question  of  its 
genuineness  would  be  an  idle  question,  not  worth  considering. 
To  assume  the  competency  of  reason,  as  the  witness,  would  then 
be  to  deny  the  necessity  of  the  revelation  and  its  value, 
which,  in  fact,  is  what  all  our  Rationalists  do,  and  probably  wish 
to  do. 

But,  in  denying  the  competency  of  reason  as  the  witness  to 
the  fact  of  the  revelation,  we  do  not  deny  the  office  of  reason  in 
determining  whether  a  revelation  has  been  made,  nor  that  the 
fact  of  revelation  is,  can,  and  should  be,  made  evident  to  natural 
reason.  We  merely  deny  that  it  is  intrinsically  evident.  It  is 
not  intrinsically  evident,  but  ea;trinsically  evident ;  not  internally 
demonstrable,  but  externally  provable.  It  can  be  proved  not 
hy  reason,  but  to  reason  by  testimony ;  and  of  the  credibility  of 
the  testimony,  reason  may,  and  should  judge. 

Three  things  must  always  be  kept  distinct  in  the  question 
of  supernatural  revelation: — 1.  The  ground  of  faith  in  the 
truths  revealed ;  2.  The  authority  on  which  we  take  the  fact  of 
revelation ;  3.  The  credibihty  of  this  authority.  The  first,  as 
we  have  seen,  is  the  veracity  of  God,  and  is  sufficient,  because 
God  is  the  ultimate  truth  in  being,  in  knowing,  and  in  speak- 
ing,  and  therefore  can  neither  deceive  nor  be  deceived.  The 
second  we  are  seeking,  and  it  is  not  a  witness  to  the  truth  of 
the  matter  revealed,  but  to  the  fact  that  God  reveals  it,  and 

2 


26  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

can  be  competent  only  on  condition  of  being  itself  supernatural 
or  supernaturally  enlightened.  The  third  is  the  crediblity  of 
the  witness  to  the  fact  of  revelation,  and  must  be  evidenced  to 
natural  reason;  or  there  will  be  an  impassable  gulf  between 
reason  and  faith,  and  we  can  have  no  reason  for  our  faith,  and 
therefore  no  faith. 

The  fact  of  revelation,  w^e  shall  show  in  its  proper  place, 
m[)y  be  evidenced  to  natural  reason  through  the  credibility  of 
the  witness,  and  therefore,  that  faith  is  possible.  But  because 
reason  is  competent  to  judge  of  the  credibility  of  the  witness, 
we  must  not  conclude  that  it  is  itself  a  competent  witness  to  the 
foct  of  revelation.  This,  conceded,  the  first  answer  is  inadmis- 
sible, for  the  fact  of  revelation  is  neither  intuitive  nor  demon- 
strable. 

2.  The  answer  just  dismissed  is  that  of  the  Rationalists,  and 
is,  in  one  of  its  forms,  substantially  the  one  which  we  ourselves 
gave  in  all  we  preached  and  wrote  on  the  subject  while  asso- 
ciated with  the  Unitarians.  The  second  answer  is  the  Protes- 
tant answer,  and  the  one,  if  we  understand  him,  adopted  by  the 
writer  in  the  Christian  Examiner.  This  assumes  that  the  Bible 
is  the  witness;  that  is,  the  Bible  intei-preted  by  the  private 
reiison  of  the  believer,  availing  himself  of  such  aids,  philological, 
critical,  historical,  &c.,  as  may  be  within  his  reach.  But  this 
answer  cannot  be  accepted,  because,  without  an  infallible  author- 
ity independent  of  the  Bi'ole,  it  is  impossible,  1.  To  settle  the 
canon  ;  2.  To  establish  the  sufficiency  of  the  Scriptures  ;  3.  To 
determine  their  genuine  sense. 

The  Bible  can  be  adduced  as  the  witness  only  in  the  char= 
acter  of  an  authentic  record  of  the  revelation  actually  made  ; 
for,  according  to  its  own  confession,  as  we  may  find  on  ex- 
amining it,  it  was  not  the  original  medium  of  the  revelation 
itself.  The  revelation,  according  to  the  Bible  itself,  in  great 
part  at  least,  was  in  the  first  instance  made  orally,  and  orally 
published  before  it  was  committed  to  writing.  This  is  especially 
true  of  the  Christian  revelation,  in  so  far  as  distinofuished  from 
the  Jewish.     It  was  communicated  orally  to  the  Apostles,  by 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  27 

our  Lord,  and  by  them  orally  to  the  public ;  and  converts  were 
made,  and  congregations  of  believers  gathered,  before  one  word 
of  it  was  written.  The  writing  was  subsequent  to  the  teaching 
and  believing,  and  evidently,  therefore,  the  primitive  believers 
either  believed  without  ha\ing  any  authority  for  believing,  or 
had  an  authority  for  believing  independent  of  written  docu- 
ments. To  them  what  we  term  the  Bible  was  not  the  witness. 
It,  then,  was  not  the  original  witness,  or,  as  we  have  said,  the 
original  medium  of  the  revelation.  Its  value,  then,  must  consist 
entirely  in  the  fact,  that  it  faithfully  records,  in  an  authentic 
form,  what  was  actually  revealed.  It  is,  then,  only  as  a  record 
that  it  can  be  adduced  as  evidence.  But  a  record  is  no  evidence 
till  authenticated.  It  cannot  authenticate  itself;  for,  till  authen- 
ticated, its  testimony  is  inadmissible.  It  must  be  authenticated 
by  some  competent  authority  independent  of  itself.  This  au- 
thentication of  the  Bible  as  a  record  of  the  revelation  made  is 
what  we  call  settling  the  canon. 

Now,  it  is  obvious,  that,  till  the  canon  is  settled,  we  have  no 
authentic  record,  no  Bible,  to  adduce.  We  may  have  a  num- 
ber of  books  bound  up  together,  to  which  the  printer  has  given 
the  title  of  The  Bible  ;  but  what  we  want  is  not  the  book  called 
the  Bible,  but  authentic  records  to  which  we  may  appeal  as 
evidence;  and  if  the  book  we  call  the  Bible  contains  books 
which  are  not  authentic  records,  or  does  not  contain  all  that 
are,  we  cannot  appeal  to  it  as  evidence ;  for  we  may,  in  the  one 
case,  take  for  revelation  what  is  not  revelation,  and,  in  the  other, 
leave  out  what  is  revelation.  This  is  evident  of  itself.  AVe 
must,  then,  settle  the  canon.  But  where  is  the  authority  to 
settle  it? 

The  authority  must  be,  1.  Independent  of  the  Bible;  2.  In- 
fallible. But  the  advocates  of  the  answer  we  are  considering 
admit  no  infallible  authority  but  that  of  the  Bible  itself  There- 
fore the  7  have  no  authority  by  which  to  settle  the  canon,  or  to 
determine  what  is  Bible  or  what  is  not  Bible. 

It  will  not  do  to  say,  the  canon  is  all  those  books  which  have 
been  received  by  the  Church  as  canonical ;  because  the  advo- 


28  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST   NO-CHURCH. 

cates  of  this  answer  deny  the  authority  of  the  Church,  and 
stoutly  contend  that  she  may  both  deceive  and  be  deceived.  It 
will  not  do  to  appeal  to  tradition  ;  for  what  vouches  for  the  in 
errancy  of  tradition  ?  And  what  right  have  Protestants  to  ap- 
peal to  tradition,  whose  authority  they  do  not  admit,  and  which 
they  contend  may  err  and  does  err  on  many  and  the  most  vital 
points  ?  Nor  will  it  do  to  adduce  the  Fathers ;  for  they  only 
establish  what  in  their  time  was  the  tradition  or  belief  of  the 
Church,  by  no  means  the  intrinsic  truth  of  that  tradition  or 
behef.     Where,  then,  is  the  authority  for  settling  the  canon  ? 

There  is  no  authority  on  Protestant  principles,  as  is  evident 
from  the  fact  that  Protestants  have  no  canon.    They  all  exclude 
from  the  canon  established  by  the  Church  several  books  which 
the  Church  holds  to  be  canonical.     As  to  the  remaining  books, 
they  dispute  whether  all  are  canonical  or  not.     Luther  rejects 
the  Cathohc  Epistle  of  St.  James,  which  he  denominates  "  an 
epistle   of  straw,"  and  also  doubts  the  canonicity  of  several 
others.    Mr.  Andrews  Norton,  a  learned  and  leading  Unitarian, 
formerly  a  professor  in  the  Divinity  School,  Cambridge,  rejects 
pretty  much  the  whole  of  the  Old  Testament ;  the  Epistle  to 
the  Hebrews,  the  Epistles  of  James  and  Jude,  the  second  of 
l^eter,  and  the  Apocalypse,  in  the  New  Testament ;  casts  sus- 
picion on  the  canonicity  of  all  the  Pauline  Epistles,  strikes  out 
the  first  chapters  of  Matthew  and  Luke,  and  such  portions  of 
the  remaining  books  as  are  demanded  by  the  conveniences  of 
his  critical  canons,  or  the  exigencies  of  his  dogmatic  theology. 
Not  a  few  of  our  Unitarians  restrict  the  canon  to  the  four  Gos- 
pels.     Several  of  the  Germans  strike  from  these  the  Gospel 
according   to    St.  John;    while  Strauss,  Baur,    and  Theodore 
Parker,  regard  the  remaining  Gospel  narratives  rather  as  a  col- 
lection of  anecdotes  illustrating  the  notions  of  the  early  Christian 
believers,  than  as  authentic  histories  of  events  which  actually 
transpired ;  and  the  great  body  of  Liberal  Christians,  who  are 
the  Protestants  of  Protestants,  agree  that  the  Bible  is  so  loosely 
written,  is  so  filled  with  metaphor  and  Oriental  hyperbole,  that 
no  argument,  especially  no  doctrine,  can  be  safely  built  on  single 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  29 

words,  or  even  single  sentences,  however  plain,  positive,  and 
uncontradicted,  or  unmodified  by  otlier  portions  of  Scripture,- 
their  meaning  may  seem  to  be.  It  is  evident  from  this  state- 
ment of  facts,  that  Protestants  have  no  canon ;  that  each  private 
man  is  at  liberty  to  settle  the  canon  according  to  his  own  judg- 
ment or  caprice ;  and  therefore  that  they  have  no  authentic  re- 
cord to  adduce  as  evidence  of  the  fact  of  revelation.  They 
must  agree  among  themselves  what  is  Bible,  what  is  inspired 
Scripture,  and  authenticate  the  record,  before  they  can  legiti- 
mately introduce  it  as  an  infaUible  witness. 

But  pass  over  the  difficulty  of  setthng  the  canon ;  suppose 
the  canon  to  be  settled  according  to  the  decision  of  the  Church, 
and  that,  by  an  inconsistency  which  in  the  present  case  cannot 
be  avoided,  the  authority  of  the  Church  to  settle  the  canon  is 
conceded ;  still  there  remains  the  question  of  the  Sufficiency  of 
the  Scriptures.  The  record,  however  authentic  it  may  be,  can 
be  evidence  only  for  what  is  contained  in  it.  If  it  does  not  con- 
tain the  whole  revelation,  it  is  not  evidence  for  the  whole.  If 
not  evidence  for  the  whole,  it  is  not  sufficient;  for  it  is  the 
whole  revelation,  not  merely  a  part,  to  which  the  Avitness  is 
needed  to  testify,  since  it  is  repugnant  to  the  character  of  God 
to  suppose  that  he  should  reveal  any  truth  but  for  the  purpose 
of  having  it  believed. 

That  the  Scriptures  do  contain  the  whole  revelation  is  not  to 
be  presumed  prior  to  proof;  because  they  themselves  testify  that 
they  are  not,  at  least  only  in  part,  the  original  medium  of  the 
revelation.  If  the  revelation  had  been,  in  the  first  instance, 
made  by  writing,  and  by  writing  only,  then,  if  we  had  the  en- 
tire loritten  word,  we  should  have  the  right  to  conclude  that  we 
had  the  whole  revealed  word.  But  since  a  part  of  the  revela- 
tion, to  say  the  least,  was  communicated  orally,  taught  and  be- 
lieved before  the  writing  was  commenced,  we  cannot  conclude 
from  the  possession  of  the  entire  written  word  the  possession  of 
the  entire  revealed  word,  unless  we  have  full  evidence  that  the 
whole  revealed  word  has  been  written.  The  fact  of  the  suf- 
ficiency of  the  Scriptures  is  not,  then,  to  be  presumed  from  the 


30  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

fact  of  their  canonicity.     It  is  o,  fact  to  be  proved,  not  taken  for 
granted. 

But  this  fact  cannot  be  proved  by  tradition,  by  the  authority 
of  the  Churcli,  or  by  the  testimony  of  the  Fathers  ;  for  these  all, 
on  Protestant  principles,  are  fallible,  and  not  to  be  depended 
upon  ;  and,  moreover,  they  all  testify  against  the  fact  in  ques- 
tion. It  cannot  be  proved  by  reason  ;  because  reason  takes 
cognizance  not  of  the  fact  of  revelation,  but  simply  of  the  mo- 
tives of  credibility.  It  must  be  proved  by  an  authority  above 
reason,  and,  as  already  established,  by  an  authority  which  can- 
not err.  But  the  Bible  is  asserted  to  be  the  only  inerrable 
authority.  Therefore  it  must  be  proved  from  the  Bible  itself. 
But  the  Bible  proves  no  such  thing,  for  it  nowhere  pi'ofesses  to 
contain  the  whole  revelation  which  has  been  made,  but  even 
indicates  to  the  contrary.  Therefore  the  sufficiency  of  the  Scrip- 
tures cannot  be  proved,  for  the  sufficiency  of  the  Scriptures 
must  mean  that  they  are  sufficient  to  teach  not  only  the  whole 
revelation  of  God,  but  the  fact  that  they  do  teach  the  whole, 
since  without  this  no  o^i?  can  know  whether  he  has  the  faith 
God  commands  him  ^>  have,  or  not.  But  in  failing  to  prove 
their  sufficiency,  they  fail  to  prove  this  fact ;  therefore  prove 
their  own  ir.sufficiency. 

It  may  be  replied,  that,  though  the  Scriptures  may  not  con- 
tain a  full  record  of  all  that  was  revealed,  they  nevertheless  con- 
tain all  that  is  necessary  to  be  believed  in  order  to  be  saved. 
We  reply,  1.  That  the  command  of  God  to  us  is  not  to  believe 
the  Bible  or  the  written  word,  but  the  revelation  which  he  has 
made  ;  and  therefore  we  are  not  to  presume  that  we  have  the 
faith  required,  from  the  fact  that  we  believe  the  whole  written 
word,  unless  we  have  first  established  the  fact  that  the  written 
word  is  commensurate  with  the  revealed  word.  2.  God,  we 
know  by  natural  reason,  cannot  reveal  what  he  does  not  re- 
quire to  be  believed  ;  for  the  truth  revealed  while  unbelieved,  is 
as  if  unrevealed,  and  its  revelation  has  no  sufficient  reason. 
But  God  cannot  act  without  a  sufficient  reason.  No  suffi- 
ficient  reascn  for  the  revelation  of  truth,  but  that  it  should  be 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  31 

believed,  can  be  conceived,  or  possibly  exist.  God  reveals  it 
that  it  should  be  believed.  Then  he  requires  it  to  be  believed. 
No  one  can  fail  to  do  what  God  requires,  without  sin ;  because 
God  cannot  require  what  he  does  not  make  possible.  If  we 
cannot  fail  to  believe  what  God  has  revealed,  without  sin,  we 
cannot  be  saved  without  believing  it.  Therefore,  it  is  necessary 
to  salvation  to  believe  all  that  God  has  revealed. 

God  cannot  make  a  revelation  and  require  us  to  believe  it 
without  making  it  so  evident  that  we  can  have  no  intellectual 
reason  for  not  believing  it.  Unbelief,  then,  must  be  the  result 
of  some  perversity  of  the  will,  some  moral  repugnance,  which 
withholds  us  from  the  consideration  of  the  truth  revealed,  and 
blinds  us  as  to  the  evidences  of  the  fact  of  its  revelation.  But 
this  perversity  of  will,  this  moral  repugnance,  is  a  sin,  and  as 
much  so  in  the  case  of  one  truth  revealed  as  in  the  case  of  an- 
other. Therefore  it  is  necessary  to  believe  all  that  God  has 
•evealed,  in  order  to  be  saved.  Therefore  the  Scriptures  do  not 
contain  all  that  it  is  necessary  to  believe  for  salvation,  unless 
they  contain  all  that  God  has  revealed. 

3.  But  waiving  these  considerations,  it  is  either  a  fact  that 
the  Scriptures  do  contain  all  that  is  necessary  to  salvation,  or  it 
is  not.  If  it  be  a  fact,  it  is  a  fact  which  must  be  proved,  and 
proved  by  a  competent  authority.  The  only  competent  au- 
thority, on  Protestant  principles,  is  the  Bible  itself  If  the  Bible 
asserts  that  it  contains  all  that  is  necessary  to  be  believed  in 
order  to  be  saved,  then  it  may  be  conceded  that  it  does.  If  it 
assert  no  such  thing,  then  it  does  not.  But  the  Bible  nowhere 
asserts  that  it  contains  all  that  is  necessary  to  be  believed  in 
order  to  be  saved.  Therefore,  the  Bible  does  not  contain  all 
that  is  necessary  to  be  believed ;  for  this  fact  itself,  of  the  suffi- 
ciency of  the  faith  it  does  contain,  is  itself  essential  to  that 
sufficiency. 

Finally,  even  admitting  the  Scriptures  may  contain  the  whole 
revelation,  it  is  not  possible  by  private  reason  alone  to  be  infal- 
libly certain  of  their  genuine  sense.  To  believe  that  the  Scrip- 
tures contain  the  whole  word  of  God  is  not  to  believe  that 


32  THE    CHURCTI    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

word  itself.  It  is  merely  believing  them  to  be  autboritauv^e 
which  is  indeed  something,  and,  in  this  age  of  infidelity,  ration- 
alism, and  transcendentalism,  no  doubt  a  great  deal ;  but  is  not 
the  faith  required.  The  command  is  not  to  believe  that  the 
Bible  is  an  authentic  record  of  the  revelation,  but  to  believe  the 
truths  revealed, — not  the  Bible,  but  what  the  Bible,  rightly 
interpreted,  teaches.  The  truths  revealed  are  the  object,  the 
material  object,  of  faith ;  and  these  evidently  are  not  believed, 
unless  the  Bible  be  believed  in  its  genuine  sense,  even  assuming 
the  Bible  to  contain  them  all. 

We  insist  on  this  point,  because  it  is  one  on  which  there  are 
frequent  and  dangerous  mistakes.  The  matter  of  faith  is  these 
revealed  truths,  which  are  fixed  and  unalterable,  universal  and 
permanent,  and  which  must  be  carefully  distinguished  from  our 
notions  or  apprehensions  of  them,  which  are  dependent  on  our 
mental  states  or  conditions,  and  change  and  fluctuate  as  we 
ourselves  change  or  fluctuate.  These  notions  are  not  the  mat- 
ter of  faith,  and  to  hold  fiist  these  is  quite  another  thing  from 
holding  fixst  the  truths  themselves.  If  these  notions,  which  are 
our  interpretations  or  constructions  of  the  truth,  were  the  faith 
required,  the  faith  would  be  one  thing  with  one  man,  another 
thing  with  another,  and  one  thing  with  the  same  man  yester- 
day, another  to-day,  and  perhaps  still  another  to-morrow.  The 
true  faith  is  an  undoubting  belief  of  the  truth,  not  what  a 
man  thinks  to  be  the  truth,  but  what  really  is  truth  ;  otherwise 
men  could  be  saved  so  far  as  belief  is  necessary  to  salvation,  under 
one  form  of  belief  as  w^ell  as  another,  for  there  is  probably  no 
form  of  error  which  its  adherents  do  not  think  is  truth.  Sin- 
cerity in  the  belief  of  error  cannot  be  the  substitute  for  Christian 
faith ;  for  we  have  found  that  the  faith  which  is  the  condition 
sine  qua  non  of  salvation  is  belief  of  truth  and  not  falsehood, 
and  of  that  very  truth  which  Jesus  Christ  revealed.  But  this 
truth  we  do  not  believe,  unless  it  lie  in  our  interpretation  as  it 
lies  in  the  mind  of  Jesus  Christ  himself  If  it  do  not  so  lie, 
then  we  misinterpret  it,  and  the  misinterpretation  of  truth  is 
not  truth,  and  to  believe  this  misinterpretation  is  to  believe  not 


THE    CHVRCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  33 

the  truth,  but  somethinu-  else.  If,  then,  avc  do  not  believe  U\q 
revelation  made  in  the  Scriptures,  in  its  genuine  sense,  in  the 
sense  intended  by  Almighty  God,  we  do  not  beheve  the  reve- 
lation at  all. 

IS'ow,  it  is  necessary  not  only  that  Ave  seize,  without  any  mis- 
take, this  genuine  sense,  but  that  we  be  intallibly  certain  that 
we  have  seized  it.  Even  admitting  that  with  nothing  but  pri- 
vate reason  we  could  hit  upon  the  genuine  sense  of  Scripture,  it 
w^ould  avail  us  nothing,  unless  we  had  this  infallible  certainty  ; 
because  w^ithout  this  inMlible  certainty  we  cannot  have  faith. 
Will  any  man  pretend  that  it  is  possible  by  private  reason  alone 
to  be  infallibly  certain  that  we  have  the  genuine  sense  of  the 
Scriptures  ?  We  may,  perhaps,  feel  certain  ;  but  this  feeling 
certain  is  not  fjiith.  Faith  is  a  firm,  unwavering,  and  unwaver- 
able  conviction  of  the  understanding,  as  well  as  a  cheerful  as- 
sent of  the  will.  The  mere  feeling  is  worth  nothing.  Every 
enthusiast,  every  fanatic,  has  the  feeling;  but  he  who  has  noth- 
ing else  is  a  mere  reed  shaken  with  the  wind,  or  a  wild  beast  let 
loose  in  society,  as  unacceptable  to  God  as  unprofitable  to  him- 
self or  dangerous  to  his  associates.  It  is  not  this  Almighty  God 
demands  of  us,  and  it  is  not  for  the  want  of  this  that  he  places 
us  under  condemnation  and  suffers  his  wrath  to  abide  upon  us. 
No ;  we  must  have  certainty,  an  intellectual  certainty,  certainty 
which  the  mind  can  grasp,  and  its  hold  of  which  all  the  crafti- 
ness of  subtle  sophists,  all  the  allurements  of  the  world,  all  the 
temptations  of  the  flesh,  and  all  the  assaults  of  hell,  cannot  in- 
duce it  for  one  moment  to  relax.  We  must  have  a  faith  which 
can  be  proof  against  all  trials,  come  they  from  what  quarter 
they  may ;  for  our  lite  is  a  warfare,  an  incessant  w'arfare,  and 
there  come  to  all  of  us  moments  when  nothing  but  a  firm, 
fixed,  and  unalterable  faith  can  sustain  us, — moments  when 
feeling,  when  the  dearest  affections  of  the  heart,  when  all  that 
can  powerfully  aflfect  us  as  creatures  of  time  and  sense,  conspire 
against  us,  and  we  must  stand  up  against  them  and  even  against 
ourselves.     0,  in  these  terrible  moments,  in  the  sacred  name  of 


34  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

Christian  charity,  mock  us  not  with  a  faith  that  melts  away  into 
mere  feeling,  and  vanishes  in  mere  fancy ! 

Now,  it  needs  no  words  to  prove  that  a  faith  which  is  not 
grounded  on  the  word  of  God,  who  can  neither  deceive  nor  be 
deceived,  will  not  answer  our  wants,  will  not  be  proof  against 
the  many  "  fiery  trials "  to  which  it  must  needs  in  this  world  be 
subjected.  But  we  have  no  such  faith  merely  because  we  have 
the  Bible  in  our  possession,  nor  because  the  Bible  contains  the 
word  of  God,  nor  because  we  read  and  study  it  and  believe  that 
we  believe  it.  We  have  such  a  faith  only  on  condition  of 
knowing  infallibly  that  what  we  take  to  be  the  meaning  of  the 
Bible  is  God's  meaning ;  for  the  faith  is  belief  of  the  truth  as  it 
is  in  Jesus,  not  as  it  is  in  us.  We  ask  again,  Can  private  rea- 
son give  us  this  certainty  ? 

This  is  a  serious  question,  and  one  which  the  Protestant  must 
answer,  before  he  can  have  any  solid  reason  for  his  faith.  It 
will  not  do  to  call  upon  us  to  prove  the  negative ;  even  if  we 
could  not  prove  that  it  is  impossible  from  the  Bible  and  private 
reason  to  become  infallibly  certain  of  the  genuine  sense  of  the 
word  of  God,  it  would  not  follow  that  we  can  from  them  obtain 
the  infallible  certainty  without  which  there  is  no  faith,  and,  if 
no  faith,  no  salvation.  He  who  affirms  the  proposition  must 
prove  it,  not  for  the  sake  of  meeting  the  logical  conditions  of 
his  opponent's  argument,  for  that  is  an  affair  of  small  moment ; 
but  for  himself,  for  his  own  mind,  to  have  in  himself  and  for 
himself  a  well-grounded  faith.  Now,  how  will  he  prove  this 
proposition,  that  from  the  Bible  and  private  reason  alone  he 
can  ascertain  the  genuine  sense  of  the  word  of  God,  and  know 
infallibly  that  he  has  that  sense  ? 

Will  he  prove  this  proposition  from  the  Bible  ?  He  is  bound 
b}^  his  own  principles  to  do  so  ;  for  this  is  his  rule  of  faith, 
and  his  rule  of  faith  should  rest  on  Divine  authority.  But  he 
admits  no  Divine  authority  except  the  Bible.  Then  he  must 
prove  it  from  the  Bible,  or  admit  that  he  has  no  sufficient  au- 
thority for  it.  Can  he  prove  it  from  the  Bible  ?  Not  in  ex- 
press terms,  for  the  Bible  in  express  terms  does  not  assert  it, 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  35 

as  is  well  known.     It  csn.  be  proved  from  tlie  Bible  only  by 
means  of  certain  passage?  which  are  assumed  to  imply  it.     But 
whether  these  do  imply  it  or  not  depends  on  the  interpretation 
we  give  them.     It  can  be  proved  from  Scripture,  then,  only  by 
a  resort  to  interpretation.     But  the  interpretation  demands  the 
application,  the  use  of  the  rule,  as  the  condition  of  establishing 
it.     But  how  determine  that  the  interpretation  which  authorizes 
the  rule  is  not  itself  a  misinterpretation,  especially  since  it  is  an 
interpretation    which  is    disputed  ?      Can   the  rule  be    proved 
from  reason  ?      Not  from  reason,  as  the  faculty  of  intuition  ; 
because  the  fact,  that  from  the  Bible  and  private  reason  alone 
we  can  infallibly  determine  what  it  is  that  God  has  actually  re- 
vealed, is  evidently  not  intuitively  certain.     From  reason,  as  the 
principle  of  reasoning  ?     From  what  data  shall  we  conclude  it  ? 
It  may  be  said,  that  God  is  just,  that  he  has  made  a  revelation, 
commanded  us  to  believe  it,  and  made  our  behef  of  it  the  condition 
sine  qua  non  of  salvation  ;  but  he  would  not  be  just  in  so  doing, 
if  this  revelation  were  not  infallibly  ascertainable  in  its  genuine 
sense  by  the  prudent  exercise  of  natural  reason.     Ascertainable 
by  natural  reason  in  some  way,  we  grant;  but  by  private  rea- 
son and  the  Bible  alone,  we  deny ;  for  God  may  have  made 
the  revelation  ascertainable  only  by  a  divinely  commissioned 
and   supernaturally   guided    and   protected  body  of  teachers, 
and  the  office  of  natural  reason  to  be  to  judge  of  the  credi- 
bility of  this  body  of  teachers.     From  the  fact  that  the  reve- 
lation is  addressed  to  reasonable  beings,  and  is  to  be  believed 
by  such,  and  therefore  must  be  made  intelligible,  it  does  not 
necessarily  follow  that  it  must  be  intelhg-ible  from  the  Scriptures 
and  private  reason  alone.     For  this  would  imply  that  the  Scrip- 
tures were   intendeed  to   be   the  medium   and   the  only  me- 
dium through  which  God  makes   his  revelation  to  men;   the 
very  question  in  dispute. 

Can  it  be  proved  as  a  matter  of  fact,  from  experience  ?  We 
have  before  us  the  history  of  Protestant  sects  for  the  last  three 
hundred  years.  A  three  hundred  years'  experience  ought  to 
suffice  to  demonstrate  the  possibility  of  their  ascertaining  the 


36  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

sense  of  God's  word,  if  it  be  thus  ascertainable.  Yet  Protes- 
tants during-  this  long  period  have  done  little  but  vary  their 
interpretations,  dispute,  wrangle,  divide,  subdivide,  and  sub- 
subdivide,  on  the  question  of  what  it  is  God  has  revealed. 
They  are  now  split  up  into  some  five  or  six  hundred  sects. 
There  is  not  a  single  doctrine  in  which  they  all  agree ;  not  a 
single  doctrine  has  been  asserted  by  one  that  has  not  been 
denied  by  another.  The  writer  in  the  Christian  Examiner  is 
a  conscientious  and  devout  Unitarian,  and  yet  how  large  a 
portion  of  his  Protestant  brethren  will  not  deem  it  an  excess  of 
courtesy  to  treat  him  and  his  associates  as  Christian  behevers  ? 
The  Gospel  according  to  Dr.  Channing  has  very  little  affinity 
with  the  Gospel  according  to  Dr.  Beecher.  Now,  truth  is  one, 
and  can  admit  of  but  one  true  interpretation.  Of  these  many 
hundred  Protestant  interpretations,  only  one  at  most  can  be  the 
true  interpretation ;  all  the  rest  are  false  interpretations,  and 
their  adherents  are  no  true  Christian  believers.  Can  any  Pro- 
testant say  with  infallible  certainty  that  his  interpretation  is  the 
true  one  ?  If  not,  how  can  he  ehcit  an  act  of  faith,  how,  if 
come  to  the  use  of  reason,  can  he  be  a  Christian  ? 

The  writer  in  the  Christian  Examiner  makes  very  light  of 
these  different  interpretations  of  the  word  of  God,  and  thinks 
difference  of  interpretation  can  do  no  great  harm,  because,  in 
his  judgment,  over  it  all  "  there  may  prevail  a  harmony  of  sen- 
timent and  a  harmony  of  life."  But  he  mistakes  the  end  of 
imity  of  faiih.  Unity  of  faith  is  essential  because  truth  is  one» 
and  there  can  be  but  one  true  faith,  and  without  this  true  faith 
salvation  is  not  possible.  "Without  faith  it  is  impossible  to 
please  God."  And  this  must  needs  be  the  true  faith,  not  a  false 
faith,  which  is  no  faith  at  all.  Our  Unitarian  friend  seems  to 
imagine  that  what  we  are  required  to  believe  is,  not  the  truth, 
but  what  we  think  to  be  the  truth  ;  that  is,  we  are  required  to 
believe  the  truth  not  as  it  is  in  Jesus,  but  as  it  is  in  ourselves ! 
Does  he  find  any  proof  of  this  convenient  doctrine  in  the  Scrip- 
ture ?  C^n  he  adduce  a  "  Thus  saith  the  Lord"  for  it  ?  If  not, 
according  to  his   own   principles,  it   rests  only  on  human  au- 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  3*7 

tboritj,  on  which  he  does  not  allow  us  to  behove ;  for  he  makes 
it  the  duty  of  the  behever  to  stand  up  firm  against  all  human 
dictation  in  matters  of  belief.  In  this  he  is  right,  and  we  must 
have  higher  authority  than  his,  before  we  can  consent  to  regard 
any  man's  constructions  of  the  truth,  unless  w^e  have  infallible 
authority  for  believing  them  the  true  constructions,  as  the  truth 
Almighty  God  commands  us  to  believe,  and  without  believing 
which,  we  must  lie  under  his  wrath  and  condemnation. 

JSTo  argument  can  be  drawn,  it  is  evident,  from  experience,  to 
prove  that  from  the  Bible  and  private  reason  alone  w^e  can 
determine  with  infallible  certainty  what  is  the  revelation  of  God. 
So  far  as  experience  throws  any  light  on  the  subject,  it  warrants 
the  opposite  conclusion,  and  makes  it  certain  that  without  some- 
thing else  faith  is  out  of  the  question.  Protestants,  in  fact, 
have  no  faith ;  nay,  so  far  from  having  any  faith,  nearly  all  of 
them  deny  its  possibility.  They  have,  as  we  have  seen,  no  au- 
thority fi-om  the  Bible,  from  reason,  or  from  experience,  for 
their  rule  of  faith  ;  and  they  cannot  be  such  poor  logicians  as  to 
infer  that  they  can  have  faith  by  virtue  of  a  rule  which  is  not 
authorized.  This  is  no  doubt,  a  serious  matter  for  them ;  for, 
ever  must  ring  in  their  ears  sine  fide  impossibile  est  placere 
Deo, — qui  non  crediderit  coiidemnahitur.  We  must,  then, 
either  give  up  the  possibility  of  faith,  or  seek  some  other  than 
the  Protestant  answer  to  the  question,  'Who  or  w^hat  is  the 
witness  to  the  fact  of  revelation  ? 

3.  The  insuflSciency  of  this  answer  has  been  felt  even  by 
Protestants  themselves,  and  some  of  them  have  proposed  a 
third  answer,  which  we  may  denominate  Private  Illumination, 
because  it  is  a  revelation  made  for  the  special  benefit  of  him 
who  receives  it,  and  not  a  revelation  to  be  communicated  by 
him  for  the  faith  or  confirmation  of  the  faith  of  others.  It  is 
contended  for,  under  various  forms,  but  the  more  common  form, 
and  the  one  with  which  we  are  principally  concerned  in  this 
discussion,  is  the  Calvinistic,  or  what  is  usually  denominated 
Christian  experience.  This  concedes  the  defectiveness  of  the 
logical  evidence  of  the  fact  of  revelation,  and  pretends  that  it 


38  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

is  supplied  by  a  certain  interior  illumination  from  the  Holy 
Ghost  in  the  fact  of  regeneration,  whereby  the  believer  ia 
enabled  to  know  by  his  own  experience  the  truth  of  the  doc- 
rine  he  beheves  or  is  required  to  believe.  The  famous  Jonathan 
Edwards  was  a  great  advocate  for  this,  and  sets  it  forth  with 
considerable  ability  in  his  Treatise  on  the  Affections^  and  espe- 
cially in  a  sermon  on  The  Reality  of  the  Spiritual  Light, 
preached  at  Northampton  in  1734.  It  is  insisted  on,  we  be- 
Heve,  by  all  the  Protestant  sects  that  claim  to  be  Evangelical. 
Indeed,  this,  in  their  estimation,  constitutes  the  chief  mark  by 
which  Evangelicals  are  distinguished  fi-om  Non-evangelicals. 

That  there  is  a  Christian  sense,  so  to  speak, — internal  tradi- 
tion, as  it  is  sometimes  called,  to  distinguish  it  from  the  exter- 
nal,— which  belongs  to  Christians,  and  which  makes  them  alto- 
gether better  judges  of  what  is  Christian  truth  than  are  those 
who  are  not  Christians,  and  that  the  just,  those  who  belong  to 
the  soul  of  the  Church,  have  a  clearer  perception,  a  more  vivid 
appreciation,  of  the  truth,  beauty,  grandeur,  and  work  of  Chris- 
tian faith  than  have  the  unregenerate  or  the  unjust,  we  of  coui-se 
very  distinctly  and  cheerfully  admit.  We  also  admit,  and  con- 
tend, that  "  faith  is  the  gift  of  God,"  not  merely  because  it  is 
belief  in  truth  which  God  has  graciously  revealed,  as  our  Unita- 
rian friends  apparently  maintain,  but  because  no  man  can  be- 
lieve, even  now  that  the  truth  is  revealed,  without  the  aid  of 
divine  grace,  that  is  to  say,  without  grace  supernatural ly  be- 
stowed. Faith  is  a  virtue  which  hiis  merit  ;  but  no  virtue 
possible  without  the  aid  of  divine  grace  has  merit, — that  is, 
merit  in  relation  to  eternal  hfe.  The  grace  of  faith  is  absolutely 
essential  to  the  ehciting  of  the  act  of  faith. 

But  this  considers  faith  in  as  much  as  it  is  divine  faith,  a  gift 
of  God,  and  lying  wholly  in  the  supernatural  order,  not  as  sim- 
ply human  faith,  in  which  it  depends  on  extrinsic  e\adence  or 
testimony,  and  the  obligation  of  a  man  under  the  simple  law  of 
nature  to  believe, — the  only  sense  in  which,  in  this  discussion, 
we  consider  it.  Unbelief,  in  those  to  whom  the  Gospel  has 
been  preached  is  a  sin  not  merely  against  the  revealed  law,  but 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  39 

also  against  the  natural  law,  which  it  could  not  be,  if  the  Go?pel 
did  not  come  accompanied  with  sufficient  endence  to  warrant 
belief  in  every  reasonable  man.     No  man  is  to  blame  for  not 
believing  what  is  not  sufficiently  evidenced  to  his   understand- 
ing, or  for  not  taking,  prior  to  his  knowledge  of  his  obhgation 
to  do  so,    the    necessary  steps    to    obtain  through   grace    the 
faith  that  translates  him  from  the  natural  order  into  the  super- 
natural kingdom  of  God.     Sin  is  predicable  of  the  will,  not  of 
the  intellect,  and  if  the  evidence  were  not  all  that  can  be  justly 
required  to  convince  the  intellect,  there  could  be  no  sin  in  sim- 
ple refusal  of  the  will  to  believe.     The  sin  lies  in  the  refusal  to 
beheve  what  is  sufficiently  evidenced  ;  for  the  refusal  can  then 
proceed  only  from  some  moral  repugnance  to  the  truth,  or  some 
propensity  of  the  will,  which  restrains  the  man  from  duly  con- 
sidering the  truth  and  weighing   its  evidence.     Undoubtedly, 
grace,  to  illustrate  the  understanding  and  to  incline  the  will,  is 
necessary  to  enable  a  man  to  elicit  the  supernatural  act  of  faith, 
or  to  be  a  true  Christian  believer ;  but  it  is  not  needed  to  sup- 
ply the  defect  of  the  evidences  objectively  considered,  because 
simple  natural  reason  itself  is  bound  to  assent  to  the  truth  of 
the  Gospel.     The  Gospel  is  addressed  to  man  as  a  reasonable 
being,  and  therefore  must  satisfy  the  reasonable  demands  of 
reason,  and  it  is  because  it  does  so  satisfy  them,  that  not  to  be- 
lieve it  is  a  sin  under  the  natural  law.     Reason  itself  commands 
us  to  believe  it.     Hence  grace  cannot  be  necessary,  simply  for 
the  purpose  of  supplying  the  defect  of  evidence,  considered  as 
all  evidence  must  be,  as  addressed  to  natural  reason. 

But  the  Calvinistic  view  is  not  that  the  private  illumination, 
or  the  grace  of  faith  is  simply  necessary  to  translate  one  into 
the  kingdom  of  grace,  and  enable  him  to  elicit  an  act  of  divine 
jr  supernatural  faith,  but  to  supply  the  defect  of  logical  evi- 
dence, for  it  is  asserted  as  the  witness  to  the  fact  of  revelatiom 
The  grace  is  bestowed  in  the  fact  of  regeneration,  and  therefore 
imphes  that  prior  to  regeneration  there  is  no  sufficient  evidence 
for  beheving  revelation.  The  mora^  obligation  to  believe  cannot 
begin  till  the  evidence  is  complete,  so  the  unregenerate  are 


40  THE    CHURCH    AGMNGT    NO-CHURCH. 

under  no  obligation  to  believe,  and  in  them  unbelief  is,  anu  63i,a 
be,  no  sin  !  This  is  not  the  Christian  doctrine,  for  God  com- 
mands all  men  to  repent  and  believe  in  his  Son,  under  pain  of 
present  wrath  and  eternal  condemnation. 

But  according  to  the  Evangelical  doctrine  regeneration  con- 
sists precisely  in  the  gift  of-  faith.  There  is,  according  to  the 
same  doctrine,  no  amissibility  of  grace  ;  once  in  grace,  always  in 
grace;  consequently,  after  regeneration  unbelief  is  impossible, 
and  the  reofcnerate  can  never  contract  the  sin  of  unbelief.  Before 
regeneration  unbelief  is  not  a  sin,  consequentl}^,  there  can  never 
be  any  sin  of  unbelief — a  most  convenient  doctrine  to  all  mis- 
believers and  infidels.  Yet  the  New  Testament  clearly  teaches, 
if  it  clearly  teaches  anything,  that  infidelity  is  a  most  grievous 
sin.     This  Calvinistic  view  is  therefore  clearly  inadmissible. 

In  another  form,  the  doctrine  of  private  illumination  is  made 
to  mean  not  merely  the  confirmation  of  the  believer's  faith  in  a 
revelation  previously  made  and  propounded  for  his  belief,  but 
the  medium  of  the  revelation  itself.  It  regards  all  external 
revelation,  all  that  may  be  called  historical  Christianity,  as  un- 
necessary, and  teaches  that  each  man  has,  by  grace,  the  infalli- 
ble witness  in  himself,  that  the  Spirit  of  Truth,  promised  by 
Christ  to  his  Apostles  to  lead  them  into  all  truth  is,  and  has 
been,  in  every  man  born  into  the  world,  from  Adam  to  the  pres- 
ent moment,  and  is  in  every  man  an  infellible  teacher,  revealing 
and  confirming  to  him  all  the  truth  which  concerns  his  spiritual 
state,  relations,  and  destiny.  We  say,  hy  grace  ;  for  we  do  not 
here  speak  of  the  doctrine  of  our  modern  Transcendentalists, 
which,  though  often  confounded  with  the  view  we  have  given, 
which  is  the  Quaker  view,  is  yet  quite  distinguishable  from  it. 
The  Transcendentalist  doctrine  excludes  all  grace,  all  that  is 
supernatural,  and  assumes,  that  man,  by  virtue  of  his  natural 
union  with  the  Di\inity,  is  able  to  apprehend  intuitively  all 
spiritual  truth.  This,  with  a  transcendental  felicity  of  expres- 
sion, has  been  denominated  "  Natural-supernaturalism."  But 
this  is  only  another  way  of  stating  the  doctrine  refuted  under 
the  head  of  the  suflBciency  of  reason  as  the  principle  of  intuition. 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  41 

"Natural-supernatural"  is  a  barbarism,  and  involves  a  direct 
contradiction.  Either  the  truths  attained  lie  within  the  range 
of  our  natural  powers,  or  they  do  not.  If  not,  the  Transcen- 
dental doctrine  is  false,  for  then  the  knowledge  of  them  would 
be  supernatural.  If  they  do,  then  they  are  not  supernatural  at 
all.  Transcendentahsm,  in  point  of  fact,  admits  no  supernatural 
order.  Its  adherents,  following  the  sublimated  nonsense  of 
that  profound  opium-eater,  and  literary  plagiarist,  Coleridge,  de- 
fine supernatural  to  be  supersensuous  ;  and  because  by  science 
we  evidently  can  attain  to  what  is  not  sensuous,  they  sagely  in- 
fer that  we  are  able  to  know  naturally  the  supernatural !  Just 
as  if  what  is  naturally  attained  could  be  supernatural,  either  as 
the  object  known,  or  as  the  medium  by  which  it  is  known  ?  Just 
as  if  nature  could  not  include  the  supersensible  as  well  as  the 
sensible,  as  if  the  soul  were  not  as  natural  as  the  body,  an  angel 
as  a  man  !  But  this  "  natural-supernaturalism "  which  makes 
the  fortune  of  Carlyle,  Emerson,  Parker,  and  we  know  not  how 
many  German  dreamers,  is  nothing  but  a  Transcendental  way 
of  denying  all  supernatural  revelation,  and  its  refutation  does 
not  belong  to  the  present  discussion.  It  is  intended  to  account 
for  the  phenomena  presented  by  the  religious  history  of  man- 
kind, without  the  admission  of  the  supernatural  or  gracious  in- 
tervention of  Almighty  God,  and  would  deserve  attention  if  we 
were  defending  Christianity  against  unbehevers.  We  have  no 
concern  with  it  now,  for  at  present  we  are  defending  the  Church 
against  heretics,  not  against  infidels. 

The  Quaker  view  is  theoretically,  though  perhaps  not  practi- 
cally, distinct  from  this  Transcendental  natural-supernaturalism. 
It  does  not  assume  that  the  supernatural  is  naturally  intelli- 
gible, nor  that  the  supernatural  is  merely  the  supersensible.  It 
admits  the  supernatural  order,  and  contends  that  the  witness 
in  every  man  is  distinct  from  human  reason,  and  is  in  the 
proper  sense  of  the  term  supernatural.  Now  this  witness,  called 
"  the  light  within,"  either  enables  us  to  see  intuitively  the  truth, 
or  it  merely  witnesses  to  the  fact  of  revelation.  If  the  first,  it  is 
too  much  ;  ^or  it  would  imply  that  the  truth  is  matter  of  know- 


42  TPIE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

ledge  and  not  of  faitb,  contrary  to  what  we  have  proved.  More- 
over, it  would  imply  that  man  is  blest  with  the  beatific  vision 
in  this  life,  and  sees  and  knows  God  intuitively,  as  he  is  in  him- 
self, which  is  not  true.  If  the  second,  then,  to  the  flict  of  what 
revelation  does  it  witness  ?  To  the  revelation  which  God  has 
made  us  through  his  Son  Jesus  Christ  ?  Does  it  witness  to  this 
by  an  inward  perception  of  the  truth  of  the  matter  revealed  ? 
or  by  simply  deposing  to  the  fact  that  God  revealed  it  ?  Not 
the  first,  because  that  would  make  the  truth  revealed  a  matter 
of  science.  Then  the  second.  But  of  this  we  demand  proof. 
Do  you  say,  that  the  spirit  beareth  witness  to  the  fact  ?  How 
will  you  prove  to  nje,  or  even  to  yourself,  that  it  does  so  witness, 
and  that  the  spirit  witnessing  in  you  is  veritably  and  irifallibly 
the  spirit  of  God  ?  Do  you  allege,  the  spirit  is  in  every  man 
testifying  to  the  same  fact,  and  proving  itself  to  each  man  to  be 
really  and  truly  the  infallible  spirit  of  God  ?  I  deny  it,  and 
millions  deny  it  with  me.  What  have  you  to  oppose  to  our 
denial  ?  Do  you  admit  our  denial  ?  Then  you  abandon  your 
doctrine  ?  Do  you  say  our  denial  is  false  ?  Then,  also,  you 
abandon  3'our  doctrine ;  for  you  admit  that  we  err,  and  there- 
fore cannot  have  in  us  an  infallible  teacher.  If  I  deny,  I  deny 
by  as  high  authority  as  you  affirm  ;  and  what  reason,  then  can 
you  give  why  your  affirmation  must  be  received  rather  than  my 
denial  ? 

Again :  How  do  you  prove  that  every  man  has  this  infallible 
witness  ?  From  the  external  revelation,  by  passages  fj-om  the 
Holy  Scriptures  ?  Then  you  reason  in  a  vicious  circle  ;  for  you 
take  the  inward  witness  to  prove  the  Scriptures  and  then  the 
Scriptures  to  prove  the  witness.  From  immediate  revelation  to 
yourself  ?  Then  you  must  prove  that  you  are  the  recipient  of 
such  revelation,  which  you  can  do  only  by  a  miracle,  for  a 
miracle  is  the  only  proper  proof  of  such  a  fact. 

But  do  you  abandon  the;  ground  that  it  is  the  external  reve- 
lation to  which  the  witness  deposes,  and  contend  that  it  is  rather 
the  medium  of  a  revelation  made  solely  to  the  individual,  than 
the  witness  to  a  revelation  made  and  propounded  for  the  belief 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  43 

of  all  men  in  common  ?  Then  it  is  nothing  to  the  purpose. 
Gxanting  its  reality,  it  can  avail  only  each  man  separately ; 
nothing  to  a  common  belief,  and  be  no  ground  for  crediting  a 
common  revelation,  or  for  making  a  public  or  external  profession 
of  faith.  But  the  revelation  to  which  we  are  seeking  a  witness 
is  not  a  new  revelation,  not  a  private  revelation  which  Almighty 
God  may  see  proper  to  make  to  individuals,  but  a  revelation 
already  made,  and  propounded  for  the  belief  of  all  men.  This 
is  the  revelation  to  be  established  ;  and  since  your  private  reve- 
lation does  not  establish  this,  or,  if  so,  only  by  superseding  it 
and  rendering  it  of  no  value  (for  it  can  prove  it  even  to  the  in- 
dividual only  by  its  being  seen  to  be  identical  with  what  the 
individual  receives  without  it),  it  evidently  cannot  be  the  witness 
we  are  in  pursuit  of.  And  this  is  the  common  answer  to  the 
alleged  private  illumination,  whatever  its  form.  It  is  valid,  if 
valid  at  all,  only  within  the  bosom  of  the  individual,  and  can  be 
alleged  in  support  of  no  common  or  pubhc  faith ;  therefore  can 
be  no  witness  in  any  disputed  case.  It  may  be  a  private  benefit, 
or  may  not  be.  It  is  a  matter  not  to  be  spoken  of,  and  a  fact 
never  to  be  used,  when  the  question  relates  to  anything  but 
the  indiN'idual  himself.  The  faith  we  are  required  to  have  is 
a  faith  propounded  to  all  men,  a  public  faith,  and  must  be 
sustained  by  public  evidence,  by  arguments  which  are  open  to 
all  and  common  to  all.  We  must,  therefore,  reject  this  third 
answer,  as  inappropiate  and  insufficient.* 

4.  From  what  we  have  established  it  follows  that  the  witness 
to  the  fact  of  revelation  is  not  reason,  the  Bible  interpreted  by 
private  reason,  nor  private  illumination.  No  witness,  then,  re- 
mains to  be  introduced  but  the  Apostolic  ministry,  or  Ecclesia 
clocens.  We  do  not  deny  the  possibility  on  the  part  of  God  of 
adopting  some  other  method  ;  but  he  manifestly  has  not  adopted 
any  other  than  one  of  the  four  methods  we  have  enumerated. 
The  fii-st  three  of  these  four  we  have  proved  he  cannot  have 

*  '^^is  subject  the  reader  will  find  still  furtlier  discussed  in  the  articles 
whi***  pillow  in  reply  to  the  Episcopal  Observer,  and  Professor  Thornwell. 


44  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

adopted,  because  they  are  inadequate.  Then,  either  the  last 
method  is  adopted,  and  tlie  Apostohc  ministry  is  the  witness, 
or  we  have  no  witness.  But  we  have  a  witness,  as  before 
proved.  Therefore,  the  Apostohc  ministry,  or  Ecclesia  docens, 
is  the  witness. 

This  conclusion  stands  firm  without  any  further  proof,  but 
we  do  not  intend  to  leave  it  without  proving  it  by  plain, 
positive,  and  direct  evidence.  But  before  proceeding  to  do  this, 
we  must  dispose  of  one  or  two  preliminary  difficulties.  Accord- 
insr  to  the  principles  we  have  laid  down,  the  witness  to  the  su- 
pernatural is  incompetent  unless  it  be  itself  supernatural,  or, 
what  is  the  same  thing,  supernaturally  aided.  But  the  Apos- 
tolic ministry  is  composed  of  men,  each  of  whom,  taken  singly, 
is  confessedly  only  Imman.  The  whole  is  only  the  sum  of  the 
parts.  Therefore  the  ministry  itself  is  only  human.  If  human, 
natural.  If  natural,  incompetent.  Therefore  the  Apostolic  min- 
istry cannot  be  such  a  witness  as  is  demanded. 

This  objection  is  founded  on  the  supposition  that  the  collec- 
lective  body  of  teachers  are  assumed  to  be  the  witness  by  virtue 
of  their  natural  powers  or  endowments,  which  is  not  the  foct. 
Left  to  their  natural  powers,  the  body  of  teachers,  taken  either 
singly  or  corporately,  would  be  altogether  incompetent,  however 
learned,  wise,  or  saintly.  The  competency  of  the  body  of 
teachers  is  asserted  solely  on  the  ground  that  Jesus  Christ  is 
with  it,  and  supernaturally  speaks  in  and  through  it;  and  in 
and  through  the  body  rather  than  the  teachers  taken  singly, 
because  his  promise,  on  which  we  rely,  is  made  to  the  body,  and 
not  to  the  individuals  taken  sing^ly.  The  ministry  is  the  organ 
through  which  our  Lord  supernaturally  bears  witness  to  his 
own  revelation.  If  this  be  a  fact,  if  our  Lord  really,  by  his 
supernatural  presence,  be  with  the  Ministry,  if  in  its  authorita- 
tive teachings  he  makes  it  his  organ  and  speaks  in  and  through 
it,  its  competency  cannot  be  questioned ;  for  we  then  have  in 
it  the  supernatural  witness  to  the  supernatural.  Whether  thir 
be  a  fact  or  not  will  be  soon  considered. 

But  it  is  still  further  objected,  that,  if  the  witness  to  the  p'- 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  45 

pernatural  must  be  itself  supernatural,  the  supernatural  can 
never  be  witnessed  to  natural  reason,  and  therefore  man  can 
never  have  any  good  grounds  for  believing  the  supernatural, 
unless  he  be  himself  supernaturally  elevated  above  his  nature. 
For  the  competency  of  the  supernatural  witness  is  a  supernatu- 
ral fact  which  can  be  proved  only  by  another  supernatural  wit- 
ness, which  in  turn  will  require  still  another,  and  thus  on,  in  in- 
finitum^ which  is  impossible.  But  we  must  distinguish  be- 
tween the  competency  of  the  witness  to  testify  to  the  fact  of 
revelation  and  the  motives  of  the  credibihty  of  the  witness.  The 
competency  of  the  witness  depends  on  its  supernatural  charac- 
ter; the  motives  of  credibility  being  needed  only  by  natural 
reason,  are  such  as  natural  reason  may  appreciate.  The  credi- 
bility of  the  witness  is  supernaturally  established  to  natural  rea- 
son by  means  of  miracles.  A  miracle  is  a  supernatural  effect 
produced  in  or  on  natural  objects,  and  therefore  connects  the 
natural  and  supernatural,  so  that  natural  reason  can,  in  some 
sense,  pass  from  the  one  to  the  other.  Since  the  miracle  is 
wrought  on  natural  objects,  it  is  cogTiizable  by  natural  reason, 
and  natural  reason  is  able  to  determine  whether  a  given  fact  be 
or  be  not  a  miracle.  From  the  miracle  the  reason  concludes 
legitimately  the  supernatural  cause,  and  the  Divine  commission 
or  authority  of  him  by  whom  it  is  wrought.  Having  estab- 
lished the  divine  commission  or  authority  of  the  miracle-worker, 
we  have  established  his  credibility,  by  having  established  the 
fact  that  God  himself  vouches  for  the  truth  of  his  testimony. 
The  miracle,  therefore,  supersedes  the  necessity  of  the  supposed 
infinite  series  of  supernatural  witnesses,  by  supernaturally  con- 
necting the  natural  with  the  supernatural.  It  is  God's  own 
assurance  to  natural  reason,  that  he  speaks  in  and  by  or  through 
the  person  by  whom  it  is  performed.  Then  we  have  the  veracity 
of  God  for  the  truth  of  what  the  miracle-worker  declares,  and 
therefore  infallible  certainty ;  for  natural  reason  knows  that  God 
can  neither  deceive  nor  be  deceived. 

The  supernatural,  It  follows,  is  provable.     Consequently  the 
character  of  the  Apostolic  ministry,  as  the  supernatural  witness 


46  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

to  the  fact  of  revelation,  is  provable,  that  is,  is  not  intrinsically 
unprovable.  It  becomes  a  simple  question  of  fact,  and  is  to  be 
proved  or  disproved  in  like  manner  as  any  other  question  of 
fact  falling  under  the  cognizance  of  natural  reason.  The  process 
of  proof  is  simple  and  easy.  The  miracles  of  our  blessed 
Lord  were  all  that  was  necessary  to  establish  his  Divine  au 
thority  to  those  who  saw  them  ;  for  it  was  evident,  as  Nico- 
demus  said  to  him,  "No  man  can  do  these  miracles  which 
thou  doest,  unless  God  be  with  him."  St.  John  iii.  2.  These 
accredited  him  as  a  teacher  from  God.  Then  he  was  necessarily 
what  he  professed  to  be,  and  what  he  declared  to  be  God's  word 
was  God's  word.  This  was  sufficient  for  the  eyewitness  of  the 
miracles. 

But  we  are  not  eyewitnesses.  True ;  but  the  fact,  whether 
the  miracles  were  performed  or  not,  is  a  simple  historical  ques- 
tion, to  which  reason  is  as  competent  as  to  any  other  historical 
question.  If  it  can  be  established  inftxlhbly  to  us  that  the  mira- 
cles were  actually  performed,  we  are  virtually  and  to  all  intents 
and  purposes  in  the  condition  of  the  eyewitnesses  themselves, 
and  they  are  to  us  all  they  were  to  them.  Then  they  accredit 
to  us,  as  to  them,  the  Divine  commission  of  Jesus,  and  authorize 
the  conclusion  that  whatever  he  said  or  promised  was  infallible 
truth ;  for  whether  you  say  Jesus  was  himself  truly  God  as 
well  as  truly  man,  or  that  he  was  only  divinely  commissioned, 
you  have  in  either  case  the  veracity  of  God  as  the  ground  of 
faith  in  what  he  said  or  promised. 

Now,  suppose  it  be  a  fact  that  Jesus  appointed  a  body  of 
teachers,  and  promised  to  be  always  with  them,  protecting  them 
from  error  and  teaching  them  all  truth ;  and  suppose,  farther, 
that  the  appointment  and  promise  are  ascertainable  by  natural 
reason,  infallibly  ascertainable,  we  should  then  have  infallible 
certainty  that  Jesus  Christ  does  speak  in  and  through  this  body, 
that  it  is  infalhble  in  what  it  teaches,  and  therefore  that  what  it 
declares  to  be  the  word  of  God  is  the  word  of  God ;  for  it  is 
infallibly  certain  that  Jesus  Christ  will  keep  his  promise,  since  the 
promise  is  made  by  God  himself,  either  directly,  as  we  hold,  or 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  47 

througli  his  accredited  agent,  as  tlie  Christian  Examiner  holds, 
and  it  is  impossible  for  God  to  lie,  or  to  promise  and  not  fulfil. 
In  this  case,  calling  this  body  of  teachers  the  Catholic  Church, 
we  could  make  our  act  of  faith  without  the  least  room  for 
doubt  or  hesitation.  "  0  my  God !  I  firmly  believe  all  the 
sacred  truths  the  Catholic  Church  believes  and  teaches,  be- 
cause thou  hast  revealed  them,  who  canst  neither  deceive  nor 
be  deceived." 

Taking  the  facts  in  the  case  to  be  as  here  supposed,  the  only 
points  in  the  process  to  which  exceptions  can  possibly  be  taken, 
or  which  can  by  any  one  be  alleged  to  be  not  infallibly  certain, 
are,  1.  The  competency  of  natural  reason  from  historical  testi- 
mony to  establish  the  fact  that  the  miracles  were  actually 
performed ;  2.  Admitting  the  facts  to  be  infallibly  ascertain- 
able, the  competency  of  reason  to  determine  infallibly  whether 
they  are  miracles  or  not ;  3.  The  competency  of  reason  to  con- 
clude from  the  miracle  the  Divine  authority  of  the  miracle- 
worker  ;  4.  Its  competency  from  historical  documents  to  ascer- 
tain infallibly  the  fact  of  the  appointment  of  the  body  of 
teachers,  and  the  promise  made  them.  These  four  points,  un- 
questionably essential  to  the  vahdity  of  the  argument,  are  to  be 
taken,  we  admit,  on  the  authority  of  reason.  Can  reason  deter- 
mine these  with  infallible  certainty?  But,  if  you  say  it  can, 
you  affirm  the  infalhbility  of  reason,  and  then  it  of  itself  suffices, 
without  other  infallible  teacher  ;  if  you  say  it  cannot,  you  deny 
the  possibility  of  establishing  infallibly  the  infallibility  of  your 
body  of  teachers. 

Eeason  is  infallible  within  its  own  province,  but  not  in  regard 
to  what  transcends  its  reach.  To  deny  the  infallibihty  of  reason 
within  its  province  would  be  to  deny  the  possibility  not  only  of 
faith,  but  of  both  science  and  knowledge,  and  to  sink  into  abso- 
lute skepticism, — even  to  "  doubt  that  doubt  itself  be  doubt- 
ing,"— which  is  impossible  ;  for  no  man  doubts  that  he  doubts. 
Eevelation  does  not  deny  reason,  but  presupposes  it.  The  ob- 
jection to  reason  is  not  that  it  cannot  judge  infallibly  of  some 
matters,  but  that  it  cannot  judge  infallibly  of  all  matters.    But, 


48  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

because  it  cannot  judge  infallibly  of  all  matters,  to  say  it  can. 
judge  infallibly  of  none  is  not  to  reason  justly.  As  well  say,  I 
am  not  infallibly  certain  that  I  see  the  tree  before  my  window 
oecause  I  cannot  see  all  tbat  may  be  going  on  in  the  moon.  It 
is  infalHbly  certain  that  the  same  thing  cannot  both  be  and  not 
be  at  the  same  time ;  that  two  things  respectively  equal  to  a 
third  are  equal  to  one  another ;  that  the  three  angles  of  a  trian- 
gle are  equal  to  two  right  angles ;  that  what  begins  to  exist 
must  have  a  creator ;  that  every  effect  must  have  a  cause,  and 
that  every  supernatural  effect  must  have  a  supernatural  cause, 
and  that  the  change  of  one  natural  substance  into  another  natu- 
ral substance  is  a  supernatural  effect ;  that  every  voluntary 
agent  acts  to  some  end,  and  every  wise  and  good  agent  to  a 
wise  and  good  end.  These  and  the  like  propositions  are  all  in- 
falUbly  certain.  Reason,  within  its  sphere,  is  therefore  infaUible ; 
but  out  of  its  sphere  it  is  null. 

Human  testimony,  within  its  proper  limits,  backed  by  cir- 
cumstances, monuments,  institutions  which  presuppose  its  truth 
and  are  incompatible  with  its  falsehood,  is  itself  infalhble.  I 
have  never  seen  London,  but  I  have  no  occasson  to  see  it  in 
order  to  be  as  certain  of  its  existence  as  I  am  of  my  own. 
History,  too,  is  a  science  ;  and  although  everything  narrated  in 
it  may  not  be  true  or  even  probable,  yet  there  are  historical 
facts  as  certain  as  mathematical  certainty  itself.  It  is  infallibly 
certain  that  there  were  in  the  ancient  world  the  republics  of 
Athens,  Sparta,  and  Rome  ;  that  there  was  a  peculiar  people 
called  the  Jews,  that  this  people  dwelt  in  Palestine,  that  they 
had  a  chief  city  named  Jerusalem,  in  this  chief  city  a  superb 
temple  dedicated  to  the  worship  of  the  one  God,  and  that  tins 
chief  city  was  taken  by  the  Ramans,  this  temple  burnt,  and  this 
people,  after  an  immense  slaughter,  were  subdued,  and  dispersed 
among  the  nations,  where  they  remain  to  this  day.  Here  are 
historical  facts,  which  can  be  infaUibly  proved  to  be  facts. 

Now,  the  miracles,  regarded  as  iacis,  are  simple  historical 
facts,  said  to  have  occurred  at  a  particular  time  and  place,  and 
are  in  their   nature  as  susceptible  of  historical  proof  as  any 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  49 

other  facts  whatever.  Ordinary  historical  testimony  is  as  valid 
in  their  case  as  in  the  case  of  Caesar's  or  Napoleon's  battles. 
Reason,  observing  the  ordinary  laws  of  historical  criticism,  is 
competent  to  decide  infaUibly  on  the  fact  whether  they  are 
proved  to  have  actually  occurred  or  not.  Reason,  then,  is  com- 
petent to  the  first  point  in  the  process  of  proof,  namely,  the  fact 
of  the  miracles. 

It  is  equally  competent  to  the  second  point,  namely,  whether 
the  fact  alleged  to  be  a  miracle  really  be  a  miracle.  A  miracle 
is  a  supernatural  effect  produced  in  or  on  natural  objects.  The 
point  for  reason  to  make  out,  after  the  fact  is  proved,  is  whether 
the  effect  actually  witnessed  be  a  supernatural  effect.  That  it 
can  do  this  in  every  case,  even  when  the  effect  is  truly  mira- 
culous, we  do  not  pretend  ;  but  that  it  can  do  it  in  some  cases, 
we  afErm,  and  to  be  able  to  do  it  in  one  suffices.  When  I  see 
one  natural  substance  changed  into  another  natural  substance, 
as  in  the  case  of  converting  water  into  wine,  I  know  the 
change  is  a  miracle ;  for  nature  can  no  more  change  herself 
than  she  could  create  herself.  So,  when  I  see  a  man  who  has 
been  four  days  dead,  and  in  whose  body  the  process  of  decom- 
position has  commenced  and  made  considerable  progress,  re- 
stored to  life  and  health,  sitting  with  his  friends  at  table  and 
eating,  I  know  it  is  a  miracle ;  for  to  restore  hfe  when  extinct  is 
no  less  an  act  of  creative  power  than  to  give  life.  It  is  giving 
life  to  that  which  before  had  it  not,  and  is  therefore  an  act 
which  can  be  performed  by  no  being  but  God  alone.  Reason, 
then,  is  competent  to  determine  the  fact  whether  the  alleged 
miracle  really  be  a  miracle.  It  is  competent,  then,  to  the 
second  point  in  the  process  of  proof 

No  less  competent  is  it  to  the  third^  namely,  the  Divine  com- 
mission of  the  miracle-worker.  In  pro\'ing  the  event  to  be  a 
miracle,  I  prove  it  to  be  wrought  by  the  power  of  God.  Now, 
I  know  enough  of  God,  by  the  natural  light  of  reason,  to  know 
that  he  cannot  be  the  accomplice  of  an  impostor,  that  he  cannot 
work  a  miracle  by  one  whose  word  may  not  be  taken.  The 
miracle,  then,  estabhshes  the  credibihty  of  the  miracle- worker. 

3 


50  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

Then,  the  miracle-worker  is  what  he  says  he  is.  If  he  says  he 
is  God,  he  is  God ;  if  he  says  he  speaks  by  Divine  authority,  he 
speaks  by  Divine  authority,  and  we  have  God's  authority  for 
what  he  says.  The  third  point,  then,  comes  within  the  province 
of  natural  reason,  and  may  be  infalhbly  settled. 

The  fourth  point  is  a  simple  historical  question ;  for  it  con- 
cerns what  was  done  and  said  by  our  Blessed  Lord  in  regard 
to  the  appointment  of  a  body  of  teachers.  It  is  to  be  settled 
historically,  by  consulting  the  proper  documents  and  monuments 
in  the  case.  It  is  not  a  question  of  speculation,  of  interpretation 
even,  but  simply  a  question  of  fact,  to  which  reason  is  fully 
competent,  and  can,  with  proper  prudence  and  documents,  set- 
tle inflillibly. 

These  remarks  accepted,  it  follows  that  the  infellible  cer- 
tainty we  demand  is  possible,  that  is,  is  not  a  priori  impossible. 
In  passing  from  the  possible  to  the  actual,  it  is  necessary  to 
establish,  by  historical  testimony,  the  miracles  of  our  Blessed 
Lord,  from  which  we  conclude  his  Divinity  or  Divine  com- 
mission, and  that  he  did  appoint  a  body  of  teachers,  commission 
the  Church  teaching,  with  the  promise  of  infallibihty  and  inde- 
fectibility.  The  first,  the  Christian  Examiner  concedes  ;  we 
proceed,  therefore,  to  the  proof  of  the  second. 

The  question  before  us,  distinctly  stated,  is.  Has  Jesus  Christ 
commissioned  a  body  of  pastors  and  teachers,  and  given  this 
body  the  promise  of  infallibility  and  indefectibility  ?  If  not, 
faith,  as  we  have  seen,  is  impossible,  and  no  man  can  have  a 
solid  reason  for  the  Christion  hope  he  professes  to  entertain. 
It  is,  then,  worth  inquiring,  whether  we  have  not  sufficient 
jDroof  of  the  fact  that  he  has  commissioned  such  a  body. 

In  settling  this  question,  we  shall  use  the  New  Testament, 
but  simply  as  an  historical  document.  We  do  this  because  it 
abridges  our  labor,  and  because  the  New  Testament,  so  far  as 
we  shall  have  occasion  to  adduce  it,  is  admitted  as  good  author- 
ity by  those  against  whom  we  are  reasoning.  It  is  their  own 
witness,  and  its  testimony  must  be  conclusive  against   them. 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  51 

Moreover,  its  general  authenticity,  as  a  contemporary  historical 
document,  would  fully  Avarrant  its  use,  even  if  not  adduced  by 
our  adversaries. 

It  must  not  be  objected  to  us,  that,  after  what  we  have  said 
of  the  necessity  of  an  infallible  authority  to  authenticate  the 
canon,  to  quote  the  Bible  to  establish  the  commission  in  ques- 
tion is  to  reason  in  a  vicious  circle.  This  is  the  standing  Pro- 
testant objection.  We  do  not  admit  it.  For,  1.  We  do  not 
depend  on  the  Bible  for  the  historical  facts  from  which  we  con- 
clude the  commission  of  the  Ecclesia  docens,  or  body  of  pastors 
and  teachere ;  for  these  facts  we  can  collect  from  other  sources 
equally  rehable,  and  do  so  collect  them  when  we  reason  with 
unbelievers ;  and  2.  We  do  not,  in  this  controversy,  quote  the 
Bible  as  an  insjnred  volume,  but  simply  as  an  historical  docu- 
ment, and  therefore  not  in  that  character  in  which  the  authority 
of  the  Church  is  necessary  to  authenticate  it. 

Nor,  again,  let  it  be  said,  that,  since,  in  quoting  the  Bible  to 
establish  the  point  before  us,  we  have  only  our  private  reason 
for  interpreter,  we  are  precluded  by  our  own  principles  from 
quoting  it  at  all ;  for  to  be  able  from  the  Bible  and  private  rea- 
son alone  to  deduce  the  faith  which  is  the  condition  sine  qua 
non  of  salvation  is  one  thing ;  to  be  able  from  the  New  Testa- 
ment as  an  historical  document  to  ascertain  a  simple  matter  of 
fact  which  it  records  is  another  and  quite  a  different  thing. 
Some  things  are  clearly  and  expressly  recorded  in  the  Bible, 
and  some  are  not.  Those  which  are  not  clearly  and  expressly 
stated  are  not  to  be  infallibly  ascertained  without  an  infallible 
interpreter.  But  if  we  are  to  deduce  our  faith  from  the  Bible 
alone,  we  must  be  able  by  private  reason  alone  to  ascertain 
these  as  well  as  the  others;  for  we  are  not  to  presume  that 
Almighty  God  has  revealed  anything  superfluous,  or  not  es- 
sential to  the  faith.  That  we  can  so  ascertain  all  that  is  con- 
tained in  the  Bible  we  have  denied,  and  still  deny ;  and  so  must 
every  honest  man  who  has  ever  seriously  attempted  the  work 
of  interpreting  the  Sacred  Scriptures.  But  that  there  are 
some  things  in  the  Bible  which  may  be  infallibly  ascertained, 


52  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

we  have  not  denied,  nor  dreamed  of  denying.  What  is  clearly 
and  expressly  taught  in  the  Bible  can  be  as  easily  and  as  infal- 
libly ascertained  as  what  is  clearly  and  expressly  taught  in  any 
other  book  ;  and  if  all  in  the  book,  were  clear  and  express,  we 
should  no  more  need  any  interpreter,  but  our  own  reason  pru- 
dently exercised,  than  we  should  for  a  decree  of  a  council  or 
a  brief  of  the  Pope.  It  is  the  character  of  the  book  itself  that 
renders  the  interpreter  necessary ;  and  the  fact,  that  its  charac- 
ter is  such  as  demands  an  interpreter  to  make  obvious  its  con- 
tents, is,  to  say  the  least,  a  strong  presumption  that  Almighty 
God  never  intended  it  as  the  fountain  from  which  we  are  to 
draw  our  faith  by  private  reason  alone.  If  he  had  so  intended 
it,  he  would  have  made  it  so  plain,  so  express,  so  definite,  that 
no  one,  with  ordinary  prudence,  could  fail  to  catch  its  precise 
meaning.  But  admitting  the  obvious  insufficiency  of  private 
reason  to  interpret  the  whole  Bible  and  deduce  from  it  the 
faith  we  are  required  to  have,  we  may  still  contend  that  by  the 
reason  common  to  all  men  we  are  able  to  determine  even  infal- 
libly some  of  its  contents.  No  objection  can,  then,  be  urged 
against  our  quoting  it  in  the  present  controversy,  especially 
since  we  shall  quote  only  what  is  clear,  distinct,  and  express, 
and  what  all  must  admit  to  be  so. 

In  proof  of  our  position,  that  Jesus  Christ  has  appointed, 
commissioned,  a  body  of  teachers  with  authority  to  teach,  we 
quote  the  well-known  passage  in  St.  Matthew's  Gospel,  xxviii. 
18,  19,  20,   "All  power  is  given  unto  me  in  heaven  and  in 

earth.     Go  ye,  therefore,  and  teach  all  nations, teaching 

them  to  observe  all  things  whatsoever  I  have  commanded 
you ;  and  behold,  I  am  with  you  all  days  unto  the  consumma- 
tion of  the  world ;"  also,  St.  Mark,  xvi.  15,  "  Go  ye  into  all  the 
earth,  and  preach  the  Gospel  unto  every  creature ; "  and, 
Eph.  iv.  11,  "And  some  indeed  he  gave  to  be  apostles,  and 
some  prophets,  and  some  evangelists,  and  others  pastors  and 
teachers." 

These  are  conclusive  as  to  the  fact  that  Jesus  Christ  did  com- 
mission a  body  of  teachers,  or  institute  the  Ecclesia  docens. 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  53 

The  commission  is  from  one  who  had  authority  to  give  it,  be- 
cause from  one  unto  whom  was  given  all  power  in  heaven  and 
in  earth ;  it  was  a  commission  to  teach^  to  teach  all  nations,  to 
preach  the  Gospel  to  "  every  creature," — equivalent,  to  say  the 
least,  to  all  nations  and  individuals, — and  to  teach  all  things 
whatsoever  Jesus  Christ  himself  commanded.  The  commission 
is  obviously  as  full,  as  express,  as  unequivocal,  as  language  can 
make  it,  and  was  given  by  our  Blessed  Lord  after  his  resur- 
rection, immediately  before  his  ascension. 

That  this  was  not  merely  a  commission  to  the  Apostles  per- 
sonally is  evident  from  the  terms  of  the  commission  itself,  and 
the  promise  with  which  it  closes.  It  was  the  institution  and 
commission  of  a  body  or  corporation  of  teachers,  w^hich  begin- 
ning with  the  Apostles  and  continuing  the  identical  body  they 
were,  must  subsist  unto  the  consummation  of  the  world.  For 
they  who  were  commissioned  were  commanded  to  teach  all 
nations  and  individuals,  and  in  the  order  of  succession  as  well  as 
in  the  order  of  coexistence ;  for  such  is  the  literal  import  of  the 
terms.  But  this  command  the  Apostles  personally  did  not 
fulfil,  for  all  nations  and  individuals,  even  using  the  term  all  to 
imply  a  moral  and  not  a  metaphysical  universahty,  have  not 
yet  been  taught ;  they  could  not  fulfil  it,  for  during  their 
personal  lifetime  all  nations  and  individuals  were  not  even  in 
existence.  Then  one  of  three  things  ; — 1.  The  Apostles  failed 
to  fulfil  the  command  of  their  Master ;  2.  Our  Blessed  Lord 
gave  an  impracticable  command  ;  or,  3.  The  commission  was 
not  to  the  Apostles  in  their  personal  character.  We  can  say 
neither  of  the  first  two  ;  therefore  we  must  say  the  last. 

But  the  commission  was  to  the  Apostles,  and  therefore  the 
body  of  teachers  must,  in  some  way,  be  identical  with  them,  as 
is  evident  from  the  command,  "  Go  ye,"  indisputably  addressed 
to  the  Apostles  themselves.  But  they  can  be  identical  with  the 
Apostles  in  but  two  ways: — 1 .  Personally  ;  2.  Corporately. 
They  are  not  pei-sonally  identical,  for  that  would  make  them 
the  Apostles  themselves,  as  numerical  individuals,  which  we 
have  just  seen  they  are  not.     Then  they  must  be  corporately 


64  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

identical.  Then  the  commission  was  to  a  corporation  of  teach- 
ers. The  commission  gave  ample  authority  to  teach.  There- 
fore Jesus  Christ  did  commission  a  body  of  teachers  with  ample 
authorit}^  to  teach, — and,  since  commissioned  to  teach  all  na- 
tions and  individuals  in  the  order  of  succession  as  well  as  of  co- 
existence, a  perpetual  or  ahvays  subsisting  corporation.  Thus 
the  very  letter  of  the  commission  sustains  our  position. 

The  lyromise  with  which  the  commission  closes  does  the 
same.  "  Behold  I  am  with  you  all  days  unto  the  consummation 
of  the  world."  They  to  whom  this  promise  was  made,  and 
with  whom  the  Saviour  was  to  be  present  were  identical  with 
the  Apostles,  for  he  says  to  the  Apostles,  "  I  am  with  you.^'' 
They  were  to  be  in  time,  that  is,  in  this  life;  for  he  says,  I  am 
with  3^ou  all  days^ — naaag  rag  rjuegag — which  cannot  apply  to 
eternity,  in  which  the  divisions  of  time  do  not  obtain.  They 
were  not  the  Apostles  personally,  because  our  blessed  Saviour 
says  again,  "  I  am  with  you  all  days  unto  the  consummation  of 
the  world^'  which  is  an  event  still  future,  and  the  Apostles  per- 
sonally have  long  since  ceased  to  exist  as  inhabitants  of  time. 
But  they  were  identical  with  the  Apostles,  and,  since  not  per- 
sonally, they  must  be  corporately  identical.  Therefore  the 
promise  was  to  be  with  the  Apostles,  as  a  body  or  corporation 
of  teachers,  all  days  even  unto  the  consummation  of  the  world. 
But  Jesus  Christ  cannot  be  with  a  body  that  is  not.  Therefore 
the  body  must  remain  unto  the  consummation  of  the  world. 
Therefore  our  Blessed  Lord  has  instituted,  appointed,  com- 
missioned a  body  or  corporation  of  teachers,  identical  with  the 
Apostles,  continuing  their  authority,  and  which  must  remain 
unto  the  consummation  of  the  world. 

The  same  is  also  established  by  the  blessed  Apostle  Paul  in 
the  passage  quoted  from  Ephesians,  iv.  11,  "And  he  indeed 
gave  some  to  be  apostles,  and  some  prophets,  and  some  evan- 
gelists, and  others  to  be  pastors  and  teachers,"  taken  in  con- 
nexion with  1  Cor.  xii.  28,  "  And  God  indeed  hath  set  some  in 
the  Church,  first,  apostles,  secondly,  prophets,  thirdly,  teachers  ; 
after  that  miracles,  then  the  graces  of  healings,  helps,  govern- 


THE   CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  55 

ments,  kinds  of  tongues,  interpretations  of  speeches."  These 
texts,  so  far  as  we  adduce  them,  clearly  and  distinctly  assert 
that  God  has  set  in  the  Church,  or  congregation  of  believers, 
pastors  and  teachers  as  a  perpetual  ordinance.  They  prove 
more  than  this,  for  which  at  another  time  we  may  contend ;  but 
they  prove  at  least  this,  which  is  all  we  are  contending  for  now. 
"  God  hath  set,"  "God  gave  to  be."  These  expressions  prove 
the  pastors  and  teachers  to  be  of  Divine  appointment,  and 
therefore  that  they  are  noi  created  or  commissioned  by  the  con- 
gregation itself  They  are  set  in  the  Church,  given  to  be,  as  a 
perpetual  ordinance ;  for  the  rule  for  understanding  any  pas- 
sage of  scripture,  sacred  or  profane,  is  to  take  it  always  in  a 
universal  sense,  unless  the  assertion  of  the  passage  be  necessarily 
restricted  in  its  application  by  something  in  the  nature  of  the 
subject,  or  in  the  context,  some  known  fact,  or  some  principle  of 
reason  or  of  faith.  But  obviously  nothing  of  the  kind  can  be 
adduced,  to  restrict  the  sense  of  these  passages  either  in  regard 
to  time  or  space.  They  are,  therefore,  to  be  taken  in  their  plain, 
obvious,  unlimited  sense.  Therefore  the  institution  of  pastors 
and  teachei-s  is  not  only  Divine,  but  univereal  and  perpetual  in 
the  Church. 

We  may  obtain  the  same  result  from  the  end  for  which  the 
pastors  and  teachers  are  appointed;  for  the  argumentum  ad 
quern  is  not  less  conclusive  than  the  argumentum  a  quo.  If 
the  end  to  be  attained  cannot  be  attained  without  assuming  the 
authority  and  perpetuity  of  the  body  of  pastors  and  teachers, 
we  have  a  right  to  conclude  their  authority  and  perpetuity ; 
since  they  are  appointed  by  God  himself,  who  cannot  fail  to 
adapt  his  means  to  his  ends.  For  what  end,  then,  has  God  in- 
stituted this  body  of  pastors  and  teachers  ?  The  Apostle  an- 
swers, "  For  the  perfection  of  the  saints,  for  the  work  of  the 
ministry,  unto  the  edification  of  the  body  of  Christ,  till  we  all 
meet  in  the  unity  of  the  faith,  and  of  the  knowledge  of  the 
Son  of  God,  unto  a  perfect  man,  unto  the  measure  of  the  age 
of  the  fulness  of  Christ ;  that  ^ve  may  not  now  he  children  tossed 
to  and  fro^  and  carried  about  with  every  ivind  of  doctrine,  in 


56  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    XO-CHURCH. 

the  wickedness  of  men,  in  craftiness  hy  which  they  lie  in  wait  to 
deceive  ;  but,  performing  the  truth  in  charity,  we  may  in  all 
things  grow  up  in  him  who  is  the  head,  Christ."  Eph.  iv.  12- 
15.  This  needs  no  comment.  The  end  here  proposed,  for 
which  the  Christian  ministry  is  instituted,  is  one  which  always 
and  everywhere  subsists,  and  must  so  long  as  the  world  re- 
mains. But  this  is  an  end  which  obviously  cannot  be  secured 
but  by  an  authoritative  and  perpetual  body  of  teachers.  There- 
fore the  body  of  teachers  is  authoritative  and  perpetual.  There- 
fore, God,  or  God  in  Jesus  Christ,  has  appointed,  commissioned, 
a  body  of  teachers,  the  Ecclesia  docens,  as  an  authoritative  and 
perpetual  corporation,  to  subsist  unto  the  consummation  of  the 
world. 

We  have  now  proved  the  first  part  of  our  proposition, 
namely,  the  fact  of  the  institution  and  commission  of  the  Ec- 
clesia docens  as  an  authoritative  and  perpetual  corporation  of 
teachers.  Its  authority  is  in  the  commission  to  teach  ;  its  per- 
petuity, in  the  fact  that  it  cannot  discharge  its  commission  with- 
out remaining  to  the  consummation  of  the  world,  in  the  pro- 
mise of  Christ  to  be  with  it  till  then,  which  necessarily  implies 
its  existence  unto  the  consummation  of  the  world,  and  in  the 
fact  that  the  promise  is  to  it  as  a  corporation  identical  with  the 
Apostles.  The  proof  of  this  fii-st  part  of  our  proposition  neces- 
sarily proves  the  second,  namely,  the  infallibility  of  the  corpo- 
ration. The  Divine  commission  necessarily  carries  with  it  the 
infaUibility  of  the  commissioned  to  the  full  extent  of  the  com- 
mission. It  is  on  this  fact  that  is  grounded  the  evidence  of 
miracles.  Miracles  do  not  prove  the  truth  of  the  doctrine 
taught ;  they  merely  accredit  the  teacher,  and  this  they  do  sim- 
ply by  proving  that  the  teacher  is  Divinely  commissioned.  The 
fact  to  be  established  is  the  Divine  commission.  This  oi^e, 
established,  it  makes  no  difference  whether  established  imme- 
diately, by  a  miracle,  or  mediately,  by  the  declaration  of 
one  already  proved  by  miracles,  as  was  our  Blessed  Lord,  to 
speak  by  Divine  authority.  Jesus,  it  is  conceded,  spoke  by 
Divine  authority,  even  by  those  who,  with  the  Christian  Ex- 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  5*? 

aminer,  deny  his  proper  Divinit}-.  Then  a  commission  given 
by  him  was  a  Divine  commission,  and  pledged  Ahnighty  God 
in  like  manner  as  if  given  by  Almighty  God  himself  directly. 
The  teachers  were,  then,  Divinely  commissioned.  Then  in  all 
matters  covered  by  the  commission  they  are  infallible  ;  for  God 
himself  vouches  for  the  truth  of  their  testimony,  and  must 
take  care  that  they  testify  the  truth  and  nothing  but  the 
truth. 

Moreover,  the  command  to  teach  implies  the  obhgation  of 
obedience.  The  commission  is  a  command  to  teach,  and  to 
teach  all  nations  and  individuals.  Then  all  nations  and  indi- 
viduals are  bound  to  believe  and  obey  these  teachers ;  for  au- 
thoiity  and  obedience  are  correlatives,  and  where  there  is  no 
duty  to  beheve  and  obey,  there  is  no  authority  to  teach.  But 
it  is  repugnant  to  reason  and  the  known  character  of  God  to  say 
that  he  makes  it  the  duty  of  any  one  to  beheve  and  obey  a  fal- 
hble  teacher,  one  who  may  both  deceive  and  be  deceived. 
Were  he  to  do  so,  he  would  participate  in  the  same  fallibility, 
and  be  the  false  teacher's  accomplice,  which  is  impossible ;  for 
he  is,  as  we  have  said,  prima  Veritas  in  essendo,  in  cognoscendo, 
et  in  dicendo,  and  therefore  can  neither  deceive  nor  be  deceived. 
Therefore  they  whom  he  has  commissioned,  must  be  infallible. 

We  prove  the  promise  of  infallibihty  also  from  the  express 
testimony  of  the  New  Testament.  "I  will  ask  the  Father," 
says  the  Saviour,  addressing  the  discij^les,  "  and  he  shall  give 
you  another  Paraclete,  that  he  may  abide  with  you  for  ever, 
the  Spirit  of  Truth,  whom  the  world  cannot  receive,  because  it 
seeth  him  not,  nor  knoweth  him  ;  but  ye  shall  know  him,  be- 
cause he  shall  abide  with  you,  and  be  in  in  you He  shall 

teach  you  all  things,  and  bring  all  things  to  your  mind  whatso- 
ever 1  shall  have  said  to  you When  he,  the  Spirit  of 

Truth,  shall  come,  he  shall  teach  you  all  truth  ;  for  he  shall 
not  speak  of  himself,  but  whatsoever  things  he  shall  hear  he 
shall  speak.  He  shall  glorify  me,  for  he  shall  receive  of  mine 
and  declare  it  unto  you."  St.  John,  xiv.  16,  17,  26  ;  xvi.  13,  14. 

They  to  whom  is  he/e  promised  the  Spirit  of  Truth  are  un- 


68  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

questionably  tlie  Apostles,  who,  we  have  seen,  were  commis- 
sioned as  teachers  ;  but  to  them  nececessarily  in  their  corporate 
capacity,  as  the  Ecclesia  docens,  not  personally,  because  it  is 
said,  the  Paraclete  shall  "  abide  with  you /or  ever-y  It  is  not  to 
a  body  of  teachers  in  general,  that  is,  to  any  body  of  teachers 
which  may  claim  to  be  Apostolic,  that  the  promise  is  made,  but 
to  that  body  which  is  identical  with  the  Apostles,  because  it  is 
said,  "  he  shall  abide  with  yow,"  that  is,  the  Apostles.  This 
identities  the  subjects  of  this  promise  with  the  subjects  of  the 
commission  before  ascertained.  The  promise  is  express,  and 
unmistakable.  The  Spirit  of  Truth  was  not  only  to  abide  with 
the  teachers  for  ever,  but  was  to  teach  them  all  things,  and 
bring  to  their  minds  whatever  Jesus  may  have  said  to  them : 
in  a  word,  to  teach  them  ^' all  truth^''  that  is,  all  truth  included 
in  the  terms  of  the  commission.  If  this  be  not  a  promise  of 
infalUbihty,  we  confess  we  know  not  what  would  be. 

The  infalUbiUty  of  the  teachers  is,  then,  established.  But,  for 
the  special  benefit  of  our  Protestant  readers,  who  are  a  little 
dull  of  apprehension  on  this  subject,  we  repeat,  that  we  do  not 
predicate  this  infallibihty  of  the  body  of  teachers  in  their  natu- 
ral capacity,  nor  of  their  personal  endowments.  It  in  no  way, 
manner,  or  shape  depends  on  their  personal  qualities  or  personal 
characters,  however  exalted,  whether  for  intelligence,  learning, 
sagacity,  or  sanctity.  It  is  God  speaking  in  and  through 
them ;  God,  who  can  choose  the  foolish  things  of  this  world  to 
confound  the  wise,  weak  things  to  bring  to  naught  the  mighty, 
nay,  base  things,  and  things  that  are  not,  and  out  of  the  mouth 
of  babes  and  sucklings  show  forth  his  truth  and  perfect  his 
praise  ;  who  can  make  the  wrath  of  men  praise  him,  and  even 
the  wicked  the  instruments  of  his  will  and  the  organs  of  his 
word ;  and  who  does  do  so  at  times,  that  it  may  be  seen  that 
his  truth  does  not  stand  in  human  wisdom,  nor  his  Church  de- 
pend on  human  virtue. 

For  the  special  benefit  of  the  same  class  of  readers,  we  re- 
mark, also,  that  the  infallibility  claimed  extends  only  to  those 
Matters  included  in  the  terms  of  the  commission.     These  are 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  59 

to  "teach  all  things  ^Yhatsoever"  Jesus  commands.  In  relation 
to  those  matters  Jesus  did  not  command,  or  concerning  which 
he  gave  no  commandment,  infallibility  is  not  claimed,  and  could 
not  be  established  if  it  were.  Nevertheless,  from  the  nature 
of  the  case,  the  Church  teaching  must  be  the  judge  of  what 
things  Jesus  has  commanded  her  to  teach,  and  therefore  un- 
questionably the  interpreter  of  her  own  powers.  To  assume 
to  the  contrary  would  be  to  deny  her  authority  while  seeming 
to  admit  it.  If  she  alone  has  received  authority  to  teach,  she 
alone  can  say  what  she  has  authority  to  teach. 

The  indefectihility  of  the  Ecclesia  docens  follows  as  a  ne- 
cessary consequence  fi'ora  what  has  been  already  established. 
The  commission  is  the  pledge  of  its  own  fulfilment.  Whatever 
commission  God  gives  must  be  fulfilled.  This  must  be  admit- 
ted, because  the  commission  pledges  God  himself.  The  com- 
mission was  not  of  a  body  of  teachers,  that  is,  of  some  body 
of  teachers  who  should  always  be  found,  but  it  was  solely,  ex- 
clusively, and  expressly  to  the  Apostolic  ministry.  It  was  to 
the  identical  body  to  whom  Jesus  himself  spoke.  He  spoke  to 
the  Apostles.  It  was  to  them,  and  to  them  only,  the  commis- 
sion was  given.  But  it  was  a  commission  the  terms  of  which 
imply  that  the  commissioned  must  remain  even  unto  the  con- 
summation of  the  world.  But  the  Apostles  none  of  them  per- 
sonally did  so  remain.  Therefore,  though  given  to  them  exclu- 
sively, it  was  not  given  to  them  in  their  personal  character,  but 
was  given,  as  we  have  proved,  to  them  as  a  corporation  or  body 
of  teachers,  in  which  sense  they  may  continue  unto  the  consum- 
mation of  the  world ;  for  one  of  the  attributes  of  a  corporation 
is  immortality,  and,  so  long  as  the  terms  of  its  charter  are  ob- 
served, it  is  perpetuated  as  the  same  identical  corporation. 
Now,  as  the  commission  was  given  to  the  Apostles  as  a  corpo- 
ration, it  was  given  only  to  that  identical  corporation,  continued 
or  perpetuated  in  space  and  time,  which  they  were.  But  this 
commission  is  a  commission  to  this  corporation  to  teach,  and  to 
teach  even  to  the  consummation  of  the  world.  Then  it  must 
exist  as  the  identical  corporation  to  the  consummation  of  the 


60  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST   NO-CHURCH. 

world.  Then  it  can  never  fail  to  exist,  or  lose  its  identity. 
The  commission  is  a  pledge  of  infaUibility.  Then  it  can  never 
fail,  or  lose  its  identity  as  an  infallible  body.  If  it  fail  in  neither 
of  these  respects,  is  is  indefectible,  so  far  as  we  have  affirmed  its 
indefectibility ;  for  we  have  affirmed  its  indefectibility  only  as  a 
body  of  infallible  teachers. 

If  there  be  any  truth  in  the  principles  laid  down,  any  reliance 
to  be  placed  on  the  promises  of  Almighty  God  made  through 
his  Son  Jesus  Christ,  it  is  infellibly  certain  that  God  has, 
throuD-h  his  Son,  established  an  infallible  and  indefectible  minis- 
try,  or  Ecclcsia  docens,  commanded  it  to  teach  all  nations  and 
individuals  "all  things  whatsoever"  he  has  revealed,  and  there- 
fore commanded  all  nations  and  individuals  to  submit  to  it,  to 
believe,  observe,  obey  whatsoever  it  teaches  as  the  revelation  of 
God.  The  only  remaining  question  for  us  is.  Which  of  the 
pretended  Christian  ministries  now  extant  is  the  true  ApostoHc 
ministry ;  that  is  to  say,  which  is  the  body  of  teachers  that  in- 
herits the  promises  ?  For  if  we  find  this  one,  we  know  then 
that  it  has  the  promise  of  infallibility,  and  that  whatever  it  de- 
clares to  be  the  word  of  God  is  the  word  of  God.  We  can 
know  then  in  whom  we  believe,  and  be  certain.  We  need 
spend  but  a  moment  in  answering  this  question.  The  ministry 
must  be  the  identical  Apostolic  ministry,  the  identical  corpora- 
tion to  which  the  promises  were  made.  It  is  the  corporate 
identity  that  is  to  be  established.  It  is  known  already,  that  it, 
at  any  period  we  may  assume,  is  in  existence ;  for  it  is  indefec- 
tible, and  cannot  fail.     We  say,  then, 

It  is  the  Roman  Catholic  ministry.  It  can  be  no  other.  It 
cannot  be  the  Greek  Church.  The  Greek  Church  was  for- 
merly in  communion  with  the  Church  of  Rome,  and  made  one 
corporation  with  it.  The  Church  of  Rome  was  then  the  true 
Church,  Ecclesia  docens,  or  it  was  not.  If  not,  the  Greek 
Church  is  false,  in  consequence  of  having  communed  with  a 
false  Church.  If  it  was,  the  Greek  Church  is  false,  because 
it  separated  from  it.     So,  take  either  horn  of  the  dilemma,  the 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  61 

Greek  Church  is  false,  and  its  ministry  not  the  Apostohc  min- 
istry which  inherits  the  promises.  The  same  reasoning  will 
apply  with  equal  force  to  any  one  of  the  Oriental  sects  not  in 
communion  with  the  See  of  Eome,  and  a  fortiori  to  all  the 
modern  Protestant  sects.  Therefore  the  Roman  Cathohc  min- 
istry is  the  Apostolic  corporation,  because  this  corporation  can 
be  no  other. 

You  object,  in  behalf  of  the  Greek  Church,  that  Rome  sep- 
arated from  her,  not  she  from  Rome.  This  we  deny.  It  is 
historically  certain  that  the  Greek  Church,  prior  to  the  final 
separation,  agi-eed  with  the  Church  of  Rome  on  the  matters 
(the  Supremacy  of  the  Pope  and  the  Procession  of  the  Holy 
Ghost)  which  were  made  the  pretexts  for  separation.  In  tke 
separation,  the  Greek  Church  denied  what  she  had  before  as- 
serted, while  Rome  continued  to  assert  the  same  doctrine  after 
as  before.  Therefore  the  Greek  Church  was  the  dissentient 
party.  Prior  to  the  separation,  the  Greek  Church  agreed  ^\-itli 
the  Roman  in  submitting  to  the  papal  authority.  In  the  sep- 
aration, the  Greek  Church  threw  off  this  authority,  while  the 
Roman  continued  to  submit  to  it.  Therefore  the  Greek  Church 
was  the  separatist. 

You  insist,  that,  though  the  act  of  separation  may,  indeed, 
have  been  formally  the  act  of  the  Greek  Church,  yet  the  separa- 
tion was  really  on  the  part  of  Rome,  who  had  corrupted  the 
faith,  and  rendered  separation  from  her  necessary  to  the  purity 
of  the  Christian  Church.  But,  if  this  be  so,  whatever  the  cor- 
ruptions of  the  faith  Rome  had  been  guilty  of,  the  Greek  Church 
participated  in  them  during  her  communion  ^yith  Rome.  If 
they  vitiated  the  Latin  Church,  they  equally  vitiated  the  Greek. 
Then  both  had  failed,  and  the  true  Church,  which  we  have  seen 
is  indefectible,  must  have  been  somewhere  else.  Then  the 
Greek  Church  could  become  a  true  Church  by  separating  from 
the  communion  of  the  Latin  Church  only  on  condition  of  comJng 
into  communion  with  the  true  Church.  But  it  came  into 
communion  with  no  Church.  Therefore  the  Greek  Church,  at 
any  rate,  is  false. 


62  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

The  same  reasoning  applies  to  tlie  before  mentioned  Oriental 
sects,  and  a  fortiori  to  Protestants.  Protestants  were  once  in 
communion  with  Rome.  They  either  were  then  in  communion 
with  the  Church  of  Christ,  or  they  were  not  If  they  were, 
they  are  not  now,  because  they  have  separated  from  it.  If  they 
were  not,  they  could  come  into  communion  with  the  Church  of 
Christ  only  by  joining  the  true  Church.  But  they  joined  none. 
Therefore  they  are  not  in  communion  with  the  Church  of 
Christ,  and  their  pretended  ministries  are  none  of  them  the 
Apostolic  ministry.  Therefore,  we  say  again,  it  is  the  Roman 
Catholic  ministry,  because  it  can  be  no  other,  and  must  be  some 
one. 

You  object,  that  the  true  Church  always  subsists,  indeed,  but 
not  always  as  a  visible  body,  and  therefore  may  be  neither  one 
nor  another  of  the  special  church  organizations  extant,  but  in 
point  of  fact  be  dispersed  through  them  all.  But  this  objection 
is  not  pertinent ;  for  we  are  not  considering  the  question  of  the 
Church  in  the  sense  in  which  it  is  taken  in  this  objection.  The 
objection  takes  the  word  church  in  the  sense  of  the  congregation 
of  the  just,  or  persons  called  and  sanctified ;  we,  in  the  ques- 
tion before  us,  take  it  in  the  sense  of  the  congregation  of 
Christian  pastors  and  teachers,  in  which  sense  it  can  neither 
be  invisible  nor  dispersed.  It  is  the  witness  to  the  fact  of  reve- 
lation, and  it  is  essential  that  the  witness  should  be  visible,  that 
its  competency  and  credibility  may  be  judged  of.  It  is  com- 
manded to  teach  all  nations  and  individuals,  and  all  nations 
and  indi\iduals  are  therefore  commanded  to  believe  and  obey 
whatever  it  teaches.  But,  if  invisible,  this  command  is  imprac- 
tible  ;  for  we  could  never  know  where,  when,  or  what  it  teaches, 
and  therefore  whether  we  beheved  and  obeyed  its  teachings, 
or  not.  It  cannot  be  dispersed  through  various  communions, 
because  it  is  a  corporation,  and  its  dispersion  would  be  its  dis- 
solution. It  is  a  corporation  of  teachers.  No  man  has  a  right 
to  teach,  unless  commissioned  by  Jesus  Christ.  Jesus  Christ, 
as  we  have  seen,  commissions  individuals  only  in  and  through 
the  commission  of  the  body.     Then  one  must  be  united  to  the 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  63 

body,  as  the  condition  of  receiving  a  commission  to  teach. 
Therefore  the  teachers  cannot  be  dispersed  through  different 
corporations.  The  teaching  body  is  infalhble,  and,  if  dispersed 
through  all  communions,  the  truth  must  be  infallibly  taught  in 
all  communions.  But  it  is  so  taught  only  in  one  communion  ; 
because  all  communions  differ  among  themselves,  and  could 
not  differ  had  they  no  error.  As  no  two  can  be  found  that 
agree,  only  one  can  have  the  truth,  the  whole  truth,  and 
nothing  but  the  truth.  Therefore  the  ministry  in  question  is 
only  one,  and  not  dispersed.  It  cannot  be  dispersed  ;  for,  if  it 
were,  it  could  not  answer  the  end  of  its  institution,  which  is  to 
maintain  unity  of  faith,  perfect  the  saints  in  the  knowledge  of 
the  Son  of  God,  and  prevent  us  from  being  children  tossed  to 
and  fro  and  carried  about  with  every  wind  of  doctrine ;  for  to 
secure  this  end  it  must  be  public,  recognizable,  #ne,  uniform, 
and  authoritative.  Nor  could  the  individual  teacher  ever  verify 
his  commission,  as  a  teacher  sent  from  God,  unless  he  can  point 
to  the  visible  body  of  w'hich  he  is  a  member,  and  which  was 
commissioned  by  Jesus  Christy  and  from  him  inherits  the 
i-nwmises.  Therefore  we  dismiss  this  notion  of  the  invisible 
Church,  and  of  an  invisible  body  of  true  Christian  teachers  dis- 
persed through  various  and  conflicting  communions.  Such 
teachers  would  be  as  good  as  none,  for  no  one  could  distinguish 
them  from  false  teachers. 

We  repeat,  then,  the  Roman  Catholic  ministry  is  the  Apos- 
tolic ministry,  for  this  ministry  can  be  no  other.  This  conclu- 
sion very  few,  pei'haps  none,  would  deny,  if  they  admitted,  what 
we  have  proved,  that  Jesus  Christ  did  institute  such  a  ministry 
as  we  contend  for.  If  there  be  an  infallible  Church,  authorized 
by  the  Saviour  to  teach,  all  must  say,  it  is  indisputably  the  Ro- 
man Catholic  Church ;  for  all  see  it  can  be  no  other,  and,  in 
fact  no  other  even  pretends  to  be  it. 

But  we  may  prove  onr  proposition  not  merely  by  the  removal 
or  destruction  of  the  negative,  but  by  plain,  positive,  affirmative 
evidence.  The  first  method  of  proof  is  conclusive  in  itself;  the 
second  is  also  conclusive  in  itself.     All  that  is  to  be  done  to 


64  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

prove  the  proposition  affirmatively  is,  to  identify  the  Roman 
Catholic  ministry,  as  a  corporation,  with  the  corporation  Jesus 
Christ  instituted  and  commissioned  in  the  persons  of  the  Apos- 
tles. The  kind  of  evidence  needed  is  the  same  as  is  requisite  in 
any  case  of  the  identification  of  a  corporation.  The  identity  is 
established  by  showing  that  the  corporation  retains  its  original 
name,  and  has  regularly  succeeded  to  the  original  corporators. 
The  name  is  not  conclusive  evidence,  but  is  a  presumption  of 
identity.  In  the  present  case,  it  is  easy  to  prove  that  the  min- 
istry in  question  retains  the  Apostolic  name.  This  name  is 
Catholic^  and  the  Roman  Catholic  Church  bears  it,  and  always 
has  borne  it.  It  is  and  always  has  been  known  and  distin- 
guished by  it,  and  no  other  corporation  is  or  ever  has  been 
known  or  distinguished  by  it.  The  old  Donatists  claimed  it, 
but  could  not  appropriate  it.  They  are  known  only  as  Dona- 
tists. Some  members  of  the  English  and  American  Episcopal 
Church,  now  and  then,  put  on  airs,  and  with  great  emphasis 
call  themselves  Catholics  ;  but  the  bystanders  only  smile,  for 
they  see  the  long  ears  peering  out  from  under  the  lion's  skin. 
While,  on  the  other  hand,  go  into  any  city  in  the  world  and 
ask  the  first  lad  you  meet  to  direct  you  to  the  Catholic  Church, 
and  he  will  direct  you  without  hesitation  to  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church.  This  shows,  that,  by  the  common  judgment  and  con- 
sent of  mankind,  the  distinctive  appellation  of  the  Church  in 
communion  with  the  See  of  Rome  is  Catholic. 

The  regular  succession  of  the  Roman  Catholic  ministry  to 
the  Apostolic  is  easily  made  out.  We  can  establish  the  regular 
succession  of  pontiSs  from  St.  Peter  to  Gregory  the  Sixteenth, 
the  present  Pope  ;  and  this  establishes  the  unity  of  the  corpora- 
tion in  time,  and  therefore  its  identity.  The  regular  succession 
and  unity  of  authority  of  the  corporation  can  also  be  established 
m  the  orders  and  mission  of  the  pastors ;  for  the  Catholic  min- 
istry has  never  been  schismatic.  This  regular  succession  and 
unity  of  authority  establishes,  of  course,  the  identity  of  the  cor- 
poration. Then  the  Catholic  ministry  is  identical  with  the 
Apostohc  ministry.     The  two  points  on  which  this  conclusion 


THE    CHURCH   AGAINST   NO-CHURCH.  65 

depends  we  leave,  of  course,  without  adducing  in  detail  the  his- 
torical proof  of  them.  Established  historically,  they  ^ya^rant  the 
conclusion.  They  can  be  established  by  conclusive  historical 
proof.     Therefore  the  conclusion  stands  firm. 

We  establish  our  proposition,  then,  by  shoeing  that  the 
Apostohc  ministiy  can  be  no  other  than  the  Roman  Catholic, 
and  by  showing  that  it  h  the  Roman  Catholic.  Nothing  more 
conclusive  than  this  double  proof  can  be  desired.  Then  we  sum 
up  by  repeating,  that  Jesus  Christ  has  instituted  and  commis- 
sioned an  infalhble  and  indefectible  body  of  teachers,  and  this 
body  is  the  congregation  of  the  Roman  Cathohc  pastors  in  com- 
munion with  their  chief.  The  Catholic  Church,  then,  is  the 
witness  to  the  fact  of  revelation.  What  its  pastors  declare  to 
be  the  word  of  God  is  the  word  of  God ;  what  they  enjoin  as 
the  faith  is  the  faith  without  which  it  is  impossible  to  please 
God,  and  without  which  we  are  condemned  and  the  wrath  of 
God  abideth  on  us.  What  they  teach  is  the  truth,  the  whole 
truth,  and  nothing  but  the  truth  ;  for  God  himself  has  commis- 
sioned them,  and  will  not  suffer  them  to  fall  into  error  in  what 
concerns  the  things  they  have  been  commissioned  to  teach. 

The  question  of  the  Church  as  the  congregation  of  believers 
can  detain  us  but  a  moment.  We  agree  with  the  Christian 
Examiner,  that  the  Church  in  this  sense  embraces  "  the  whole 
company  of  believers,  the  uncounted  and  wide-spread  congrega- 
tion of  all  those  who  receive  the  Gospel  as  the  law  of  life  ;  that 
the  Church  of  Christ  comprehends  and  is  composed  of  all  his 
followers."  But  who  are  these  ?  "  My  sheep,"  says  our  blessed 
Lord,  "hear  my  voice  and  follow  me."  We  must  hear  his 
voice,  as  the  condition  of  following  him,  or  being  his  followers. 
But  we  cannot  hear  his  voice  where  it  is  not,  where  it  speaks 
not.  Where,  then,  speaks  his  voice  ?  In  the  Catholic  Church, 
in  and  through  the  Cathohc  pastors,  and  nowhere  else.  Then 
we  hear  his  voice  only  as  we  hear  the  voice  of  the  Catholic 
Church,  and  follow  him  only  as  we  follow  what  this  Church  in 
his  name  commands.  Only  they,  then,  who  hear  and  obey  the 
Cathohc  Church  are  of  the  Church,— onlv  they  who  are  in  the 


66  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

communion  of  this  Churcli  are  in  the  communion  of  Christ.  It 
is  time,  then,  to  abandon  No-Churchism,  and  to  return  to  the 
one  fold  of  the  one  Shepherd,  and  submit  ourselves  to  the 
guidance  of  the  pastors  he  has  made  rulers  and  teachers  of  the 
flock. 

We  do  not  suppose  this  conclusion  will  be  very  pleasing  to 
our  Protestant  readers,  and  we  do  not  suppose  anything  we 
could  say,  conscientiously,  would  please  them  ;  for  we  do  not 
see  any  right  they  have  to  be  pleased,  standing  where  they  do. 
There  is  the  stubborn  fact,  that  no  man  has  God  for  his  father 
who  has  not  the  Church  for  his  mother,  which  cannot  be 
got  over  ;  and  if  we  have  not  the  true  Church  for  our  mother, 
then  "  are  we  bastards  and  not  sons."  The  presumption,  to  say 
the  least,  is  strongly  against  our  Protestant  brethren ;  and  they 
have  great  reason  to  fear,  that,  after  all,  they  are  only  "  children 
of  the  bondwoman."  They  may  try  to  hide  this  from  them- 
selves, and  to  stifle  the  voice  of  conscience  by  crying  out 
"Popery!"  "Papist!"  "Romanist!"  "Idolatry!"  "Super- 
stition ! "  and  the  like,  but  this  can  avail  them  little.  They 
may  make  light  of  the  question,  and  think  themselves  excused 
from  considering  it.  But  there  comes  and  must  come  to  the 
greater  part  of  them  an  hour  when  they  feel  the  need  of  some- 
thing more  substantial  than  anything  they  have.  They  may  use 
swelling  words,  and  speak  in  a  tone  of  great  confidence ;  but 
the  best  of  them  have  their  doubts,  nay,  long  periods  when  they 
can  keep  up  their  courage,  and  persuade  themselves  that  they 
hope,  only  by  shutting  their  eyes,  refusing  to  think,  plunging 
into  religious  dissipation,  or  giving  way  to  the  wild  and  destruc- 
tive bursts  of  fanaticism  and  superstition.  The  great  question 
of  the  salvation  of  the  soul  must  at  times  press  heavily  upon 
them,  and  create  no  little  anxiety.  For  it  is  a  terrible  thing  to 
be  forced  into  the  presence  of  God  uncovered  by  the  robe  of  the 
Redeemer's  righteousness, — a  terrible  thing  to  have  all  the  sins 
of  our  past  life  come  thronging  back  on  the  memory,  and  to  feel 
that  they  are  registered  against  us,  unrepented  of,  unforgiven ; 
a  terrible  thing  to  feel  that  the  number  of  these  sins  is  daily 


THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH.  67 

and  hourly  increasing,  that  we  ourselves  are  continually  exposed 
to  the  aUuremeuts  of  the  world,  the  seductions  of  the  flesh,  and 
the  temptations  of  the  devil,  with  no  weapon  but  our  own  puny 
arm  with  which  to  defend  ourselves,  and  no  strength  but  our 
own  infirmity  with  which  to  recover  and  maintain  our  integ- 
rity. Alas  !  we  know  what  this  is.  We  know  what  it  is 
to  feel  oppressed  with  the  heavy  load  of  guilt,  to  struggle 
alone  in  the  world,  against  all  manner  of  enemies,  ^vithout 
faith,  without  hope,  without  the  help  of  God's  sacraments  ;  we 
know  what  it  is  to  feel  that  Ave  must  trust  in  our  own  arm  and 
heart,  stand  on  the  pride  of  our  own  intellect  and  conviction. 
We  know,  too,  what  it  is  to  feel  all  these  defences  fail,  ail  this 
trust  give  way ;  for  to  us  have  come,  as  well  as  to  others,  those 
trying  moments  when  the  loftiest  are  laid  low,  and  the  proud- 
est, prostrate  in  the  dust,  cry  out  from  the  depth  of  their 
spiritual  agony,  "  Is  there  no  help  ?  0  God !  why  standest 
thou  afar  ofi'  ?  Help,  help,  or  I  perish ! "  Alas  !  there  are 
moments  when  w^e  cannot  trifle,  when  we  cannot  lean  on  a 
broken  reed,  when  we  must  have  something  really  Divine, 
something  on  which  we  can  lay  hold  that  will  not  break,  and 
leave  us  to  drop  into  everlasting  perdition.  It  is  a  terrible 
question  this  of  the  salvation  of  the  soul,  and  no  man  can  pru- 
dently pui  it  off.  It  must  be  met  and  answered,  and  the  sooner 
the  better. 

We  urge  this  upon  our  Protestant  brethren.  They  have  no 
solid  ground  on  which  to  stand,  no  sure  help  on  which  to  rely 
Their  own  restlessness  proves  it ;  their  perpetual  variations  and 
shifting  of  their  creeds  prove  it ;  the  new  and  strange  sects  con- 
stantly springing  up  amongst  them  prove  it ;  their  worldly- 
mindedness,  their  universal  and  perpetual  striving  after  what 
they  have  not,  and  find  not,  prove  it ;  the  wide-spread  infidelity 
which  prevails  among  them,  and  the  still  more  destructive  in- 
differency  prove  it.  Their  spiritual  strength  is  the  strength  of 
self-confidence  or  of  desperation.  They  cannot  live  so.  There 
is  no  good  for  them  in  their  present  state.  Why  will  they  not 
ask  if  there  be  not  a  better  way  ?     If  they  will  but  seek,  they 


68  THE    CHURCH    AGAINST    NO-CHURCH. 

shall  find, — knock,  it  shall  be  opened  to  them.  There  is  that 
faith  which  they  deny,  and  that  certainty  which  they  ridicule. 
But  they  will  find  it  not  in  their  pride.  They  will  find  it  not, 
till  they  learn  to  look  on  him  they  have  despised,  and  to  fly  for 
succour  to  him  they  have  crucified.  But  we  have  been  be- 
trayed into  remarks,  which,  though  true,  would  come  with  a 
better  grace  from  one  whose  faith  is  less  recent  than  our  own. 
Yet  we  have  said  nothing  by  way  of  vain-glory.  If  we  have 
faith,  it  is  no  merit  of  ours.  We  have  been  brought  by  a  way 
we  knew  not,  and  by  a  Power  we  dared  not  resist ;  and  His 
the  praise  and  the  glory,  and  ours  the  shame  and  mortification 
that  for  so  many  years  we  groped  in  darkness,  boasting  that 
we  could  see,  and  holding  up  our  farthing-candle  of  a  mis- 
guided reason  as  a  light  that  was  to  enlighten  the  world ! 

We  have  been  asked,  "  How  in  the  world  have  you  become 
a  Catholic  ? "  In  this  essay  we  have  presented  an  outline,  or 
rather  a  specimen,  of  the  answer  we  have  to  give.  It  is  incom- 
plete ;  but  it  will  satisfy  the  attentive  reader,  that  not  without 
some  show  of  reason,  at  least,  have  we  left  our  former  friends 
and  the  endearing  associations  of  our  past  life,  and  joined  our- 
selves to  a  Church  which  excites  only  the  deadly  rage  of  the 
great  mass  of  our  countrymen.  The  change  with  us  is  a  great 
one,  and  a  greater  one  than  the  world  dreams  of,  or  will  dream 
of.  At  any  rate,  it  is  a  change  we  would  not  have  made  if  we 
could  have  helped  it, — a  change  against  which  we  struggled 
long,  but  for  which,  though  it  makes  us  a  pilgrim  and  a 
sojourner  in  life,  and  permits  us  no  home  here  below,  we  can 
never  sufficiently  praise  and  thank  our  God.  It  is  a  great  gain 
to  lose  even  earth  for  heaven.  If,  however,  we  be  pressed  to 
give  the  full  reason  of  our  change,  we  must  refer  to  the  grace 
of  God,  and  the  need  we  felt  of  saving  our  own  soul. 


THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER    VERSUS    THE    CHURCH  69 


THE   EPISCOPAL   OBSERVER   versus   THE   CHURCH. 

THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER,    VOL.    I.,    NO.  III.       BOSTON. 
MAY,    1845.      MONTHLY.* 

This  periodical,  the  recently  established  organ  of  the  Evan- 
gehcal  division  of  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church,  in  its  num- 
ber for  May  last,  contains  an  attempted  refutation  of  the  article 
headed  The  Church  against  No-Church,  in  our  last  Review. 
The  writer  after  a  prehminary  flourish  or  two,  says  his  "  pur- 
pose is  to  have  the  f)leasure  of  refuting"  us.  We  presume 
from  this  that  his  purpose  is  to  have  the  pleasure  of  refuting 
the  main  position  or  leading  doctrine  of  the  article.  That 
position  or  doctrine,  as  we  stated  it,  is,  that,  "  ^'ith  this  theory 
alone  (the  No-Church  theory),  it  is  impossible  to  elicit  an  act 
of  faith :"  or,  in  other  words,  that  it  is  not  possible  to  elicit  an 
act  of  faith,  unless  we  accept  the  authority  of  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  as  the  witness  and  expounder  of  God's  word. 
Now,  to  refute  this,  it  is  not  enough  to  invalidate  our  reasoning 
in  this  or  that  particular,  but  it  is  necessary  to  prove  positively 
that  an  act  of  faith  can  be  elicited  by  those  who  reject  this  au- 
thority. But  this  the  writer  has  not  done,  and,  so  far  as  we  can 
see,  has  not  even  attempted  to  do.  He  cannot,  then,  whatever 
else  he  may  have  done,  have  refuted  us.  All  he  has  done,  ad- 
mitting him  to  have  done  all  he  has  attempted,  is,  to  prove, 
not  that  we  were  wrong  in  asserting  the  necessity  of  the  author- 
ity of  the  Church  to  elicit  an  act  of  faith,  but  that  it  is  im- 
possible for  any  one  to  elicit  an  act  of  faith  at  all,  as  we  shall 
soon  have  occasion  to  see. 

But,  in  point  of  fact,  the  writer  has  not  done  what  he  at- 
tempted ;  he  has  not  invahdated  our  reasoning  in  a  single  par- 
ticular ;  and  if  he  has  succeeded  in  refuting  any  one,  it  is  him- 
self.    He  begins  by  giving,  professedly,  a  synopsis  of  our  argu- 
*  July,  1845. 


70  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

ment ;  but  his  synopsis  is  very  imperfect.  It  leaves  out  several 
distinct  positions  we  assumed  and  attempted  to  establish  as  es- 
sential to  the  argument  we  were  conducting.  If  this  is  by  de- 
sign, it  impeaches  the  fairness  and  honesty  of  the  writer  ;  if 
unintentional,  it  shows  that  he  did  not  comj>rehend  the  article 
he  undertook  to  refute,  and  impeaches  his  capacity. 

Our  readers  will  recollect  that  we  begin  our  argument  by  as- 
suming, that,  in  order  to  be  saved,  to  be  acceptable  to  God,  to 
enter  into  life,  it  is  necessary  to  be  a  Christian.  We  then  pro- 
ceed to  establish,  1.  That,  in  order  to  be  a  Christian,  it  is  neces- 
sary to  be  a  behever,  to  believe  somewhat ;  2.  That  this  some- 
what is  TRUTH  NOT  FALSEHOOD  *,  3.  That  the  truth  we  are  to 
believe  is  the  truth  Jesus  Christ  taught  or  revealed;  and,  4. 
That  this  truth,  pertains,  in  part,  at  least,  to  the  supernatural 
order.  Now,  the  second  position,  namely,  that,  in  order  to  be  a 
Christian  believer,  it  is  necessary  to  believe  truth,  not  false- 
hood, the  Observer  entirely  omits,  and  takes  no  notice  of  it,  in 
its  attempted  refutation  of  us.  Why  is  this  ?  The  Observer 
cannot  suppose  we  inserted  this  proposition  without  a  design,  or 
that  it  is  of  no  importance  to  our  agument.  The  position  is 
both  positive  and  negative,  and  asserts,  that,  to  be  a  Chi-istian 
believer,  it  is  necessary  not  only  to  believe  truth,  but  truth  with- 
out mixture  of  falsehood.  A  very  important  position,  and  one 
on  which  much  of  our  subsequent  reasoning  depended,  and 
designed  to  meet  the  very  doctrine  contended  for  by  the  Ob- 
server,— namely,  that  we  have  all  the  faith  required  of  us,  if  we 
believe  Christian  truth,  though  we  believe  it  mixed  with  error, 
in  an  exact  or  in  a  false  sense. 

After  having  established  the  four  positions  just  enumerated, 
we  proceed,  in  the  second  di\'ision  of  our  article,  to  state  the 
necessary  conditions  of  faith  in  truths  pertaining  to  the  super- 
natural order,  or  what  we  need  in  order  to  be  able  to  elicit  an 
act  of  faith  in  a  revelation  of  supernatural  truth.  Under  this 
di\ision,  we  attempt  to  establish,  1.  That  faith  demands  an 
authority  on  which  to  rest,  extrinsic  both  to  the  believer  and 
the  matter  believed ;  2.  That  the  only,  but  sufficient,  authority 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  Yl 

for  the  intrinsic  truth  of  the  matter  of  supernatural  revelation 
is  the  veracity  of  God  ;  3.  That  a  witness  to  the  fact  that  God 
has  actually  revealed  the  matter  in  question,  that  is,  a  witness 
to  the  fact  of  revelation,  is  also  necessary ;  4.  That  this  witness 
must  be  not  merely  a  witness  to  the  fact  that  God  has  made  a 
revelation,  or  to  the  fact  of  revelation  in  general,  but  to  the 
precise  revelation  in  each  particular  case  in  which  there  may  be 
a  question  of  what  is  or  is  not  the  revelation  of  God, — there- 
fore an  interpreter,  as  we  expressed  ourselves,  of  the  genuine 
sense  of  the  revelation  ;  5.  That  this  witness  must  be  universal, 
subsisting  through  all  times  and  nations ;  6.  Unmistakable, 
with  ordinary  prudence,  by  the  simple  and  illiterate  ;  and,  7. 
Infiillible. 

Now,  of  these  seven  positions,  the  writer  in  the  Observer  ob- 
jects expressly  to  the  fourth,  and,  by  implication,  to  the  sev- 
enth. But  he  takes  no  notice  of  our  definition  of  faith,  namely, 
that  "t7  is  a  theological  virtue,  which  consists  in  believing, 
without  doubting,  explicitly  or  imj^Ucitly,  all  the  truths  Al- 
mighty God  has  revealed,  on  the  veracity  of  God  alone^'' — on 
which,  he  must  be  aware,  rests  nearly  the  whole  of  our  argu- 
ment for  the  necessity  of  an  infallible  witness  to  the  fact  of  rev- 
elation ;  for,  if  faith  consists  in  believing  ivithout  doubting,  it  is 
obvious  that  it  is  impossible  to  elicit  an  act  of  faith  on  the  au- 
thority of  a  fallible  witness.  It  can  be  possible  only  where 
there  is  no  reasonable  ground  for  doubt  as  to  what  God  has 
actually  revealed ;  and  there  always  is  reasonable  ground  for 
doubt,  where  the  reliance  is  on  a  falhble  witness,  that  is,  a  wit- 
ness that  may  deceive  or  be  deceived.  Our  conclusion,  then, 
that  the  witness  must  be  infallible,  or  faith  is  not  possible, 
must  be  admitted,  if  our  definition  of  faith  is  accepted.  We 
were  not  to  be  refuted,  then,  on  this  point,  except  by  a  refu- 
tation of  our  definition  of  faith.  But  the  writer  in  the  Observer 
does  not  refute  this  definition,  for  he  does  not  even  notice  it. 
How,  then,  can  he  claim  to  himself  the  "pleasure"  of  having 
refuted  us? 

But  the  writer  in  the  Observer  objects  strongly  to  the  fourth 


*72  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

position  of  the  second  division  of  our  article.  He  says  we  af- 
firm that  we  need  "  an  interpreter  of  the  genuine  sense  of  what 
God  has  revealed,  because  God  has  made  faith  the  condition 
sine  qua  non  of  salvation ;  and  if  we  should  mistake  the  propo- 
sitions actually  contained  in  God's  revelation,  or  substitute 
others  therefor,  since  it  is  only  through  the  proposition  we  ar- 
rive at  the  matter  revealed,  we  should  not  believe  the  revelation 
God  has  actually  made,  hut  something  else,  and  something  for 
which  loe  cannot  plead  the  veracity  of  God,  and  therefore 
something  for  which  we  have  no  solid  ground  of  faith.''''  The 
portion  of  this  sentence  in  Italics  the  writer  discreetly  omits  in 
his  quotation.  Our  doctrine  was  this  : — The  ground  of  faith  in 
the  truth  or  matter  revealed  is  the  veracity  of  God  revealing  it. 
But  when  we  believe  the  matter  revealed  in  a  false  sense,  not  in 
its  genuine  sense,  we  do  not,  in  fact,  believe  what  is  revealed, 
but  something  else,  and,  therefore,  something  which  God  has 
not  revealed,  and  for  the  truth  of  which  we  have  not  his 
veracity.  Consequently,  we  need  an  interpreter,  that  is,  some 
means,  or,  as  we  say  in  the  article,  "  some  authority,  extrinsic 
or  intrinsic,"  to  say  what  is  or  is  not  the  revelation  in  its  gen- 
uine sense ;  which  is  only  saying,  what  is  or  is  not  the  revela- 
tion Almighty  God  has  actually  made.  Is  it  not  so  ?  Are  we 
not  right  in  this?  The  writer  in  the  Observer  says  no.  He 
objects  to  this,  because  we  here,  he  says,  assume  "  three  things 
which  need  a  little  looking  after  :  1.  That  God's  revela- 
tion to  man  is  not  intelligible.  2.  That  a  human  interpreter 
can  make  it  plain.  3.  That,  unless  the  nice  theological  shades 
of  meaning  in  God's  word  are  appreciated,  one  cannot  be  saved. 
In  general  terms,  we  deny  all  these  propositions."  So  do  we  ; 
and,  moreover,  we  deny  that  w^e  assume,  or  that  our  argument 
implies,  either  one  or  another  of  them. 

The  Observer  contends  that  God's  revelation  is  made  to  us  in 
terms  as  express  and  as  intelligible  as  human  language  can 
make  it.  "  Natural  reason,"  it  says,  "  teaches  us  enough  of  God 
to  know  that  he  is  infinitely  wise,  benevolent,  and  good.  An 
infinitely  wise,  benevolent,  and  good  being,  in  making  a  revela- 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  73 

tion  to  dependent  and  erring  creatures,  could  not  do  otherwise 
than  adapt  it,  in  the  most  perfect  manner,  to  their  condition." 
Be  it  so;  we  said  as  much,  more  than  once,  ourselves.  But 
what  is  "the  most  perfect  manner?"  "A  revelation,"  con- 
tinues the  Observer^  "  coming  from  such  a  being,  would  be  con- 
veyed in  intelligible  propositions,  so  expressed  and  arranged  as 
to  be  least  liable  to  be  misunderstood."  In  propositions  intel- 
ligible through  the  ministry  of  the  Church  teaching,  we  gi-ant 
it ;  otherwise,  we  deny  it,  because  he  has  not  so  conveyed^  ex- 
pressed, and  arranged  it.  "  Then,  if  a  revelation  have  come 
from  God,  it  must  be  as  clear  and  intelligible  as  human  lan- 
guage can  make  it."  Through  the  same  ministry,  we  concede 
it ;  otherwise,  we  deny  it,  and  for  the  same  reason. 

There  was  no  occasion  to  assert  the  intelligibleness  of  divine 
revelation  against  us,  for  that  we  conceded.  The  real  question 
at  issue  is  not  whether  the  revelation  be  intelligible,  but  whether 
it  be  intelligible  without  the  aid  of  the  pastors  of  the  Church. 
The  Observer  was  bound  to  show  that  no  such  aid  is  needed,  or 
else  not  secure  the  "  pleasure"  of  refuting  us.  We  knew  before- 
hand the  only  argument  he  could  adduce,  and  that  argument 
we  ourselves  adduced  and  replied  to.  The  Observer  has  merely 
brought  against  us  this  objection,  without  noticing  our  rej)ly  to 
it.  We  stated,  "  It  may  be  said  that  God  is  just,  that  he  has 
made  us  a  revelation,  commanded  us  to  believe  it,  and  made 
belief  of  it  the  condition  sine  qua  no7i  of  salvation  ;  but  that  he 
would  not  be  just  in  so  doing,  if  this  revelation  were  not  infalli- 
bly ascertainable  in  its  genuine  sense  by  the  prudent  exercise  of 
natural  reason."  Here  is  the  argument  of  the  Observer,  taken 
in  connexion  with  what  we  had  previously  said  of  what  natural 
reason  teaches  us  of  God,  as  clearly  and  as  forcibly  put  as  the 
Observer  itself  has  put  it ;  and  here  is  our  reply  : — "  Ascertain- 
able by  natural  reason,  in  one  method  or  another,  we  grant ;  by 
private  reason  and  the  Bible  alone,  we  deny  ;  for  God  may 
have  made  the  revelation  ascertainable  only  by  a  divinely  com.- 
missioned  and  supernaturally  guided  and  protected  body  of 
teachers,  and  the  office  of  natural  reason  to  be  to  judge  of  the 

4 


74  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

credibility  of  this  body  of  teachers^  This  reply  is  conclusive,, 
at  least  till  shown  to  be  inconclusive ;  consequently  the  writer 
in  the  Observer  was  precluded,  by  the  most  ordinary  rules  of 
logic  and  morals,  from  insisting  on  the  objection,  till  he  had  not 
only  noticed,  but  refuted,  the  reply.  He  has  done  neither.  He 
has  taken  an  objection  which  we  had  anticipated  and  replied  to, 
urged  it  against  us,  without  deigning  to  notice  our  reply,  and 
this  he  calls  refuting  us  I 

The  writer  in  the  Observer  proceeds  in  his  argument  against 
a  position  he  says  we  assume  but  which  we  do  not  assume,  on 
the  assumption  that  the  revelation  Almighty  God  has  made  to 
us  is  made  exclusively  in  the  written  word,  and  is  made  "  in  in- 
telligible propositions,  so  expressed  and  arranged  as  to  be  least 
liable  to  be  misunderstood,"  "  as  clear  and  as  intelligible  as  lan- 
guage can  make  it."  This  assumption  we  met  and  refuted,  or 
attempted  to  refute,  in  our  article ;  but  the  Observer^  according 
to  its  custom,  takes  no  notice  of  our  refutation,  or  attempted 
refutation.      This  assumption  is  provable  only  in  two  ways  : 

1.  A  priori,  by  reasoning  from  the  known  character  of  God; 

2.  A  posteriori,  by  reasoning  from  the  character  of  the  revela- 
tion actually  made.  The  first  method  can  avail  it  nothing,  for 
the  reason  we  before  assigned,  and  have  just  now  repeated. 
We  adduced,  in  our  article,  several  arguments  and  facts  to  show 
that  the  second  method  can  avail  it  just  as  little.  These  facts 
and  arguments  it  does  not  set  aside,  does  not  attempt  to  set 
aside,  for  it  does  not  even  notice  them,  or  make  an  effort  to 
show  that  its  assumption  may  be  true  in  spite  of  them.  And 
yet  it  purposed  to  have  the  "  pleasure"  of  refuting  us  !  and  we 
are  gi-avely  assured  by  another  Episcopal  organ.  The  Christian 
Advocate  and  Witness,  that  it  really  has  refuted  us,  and  in  a 
masterly  manner  turned  our  logic  against  us.  Really,  these 
Episcopahans  have  queer  notions  of  what  constitutes  a  refutation 
of  an  opponent. 

But  we  deny  the  assumption  of  the  Episcopal  Observer,  iind 
call  upon  the  writer  to  reply  to  the  facts  and  arg^uments  we  ad- 
duced against  it.     Will  he,  in  open  day,  maintain  that  the  sev- 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  7S 

eral  articles  of  Christian  faith,  even  as  he  holds  them,  are  ex- 
pressed in  the  Sacred  Scriptures  in  propositions  as  clear  and  in- 
telligible as  hiiinan  language  can  make  them  ?  He  is  an  Epis- 
copalian, and  therefore  believes,  we  are  bound  to  presume,  in 
the  Nicene  creed.  Will  he  tell  us  where  in  the  Sacred  Scrip- 
tures the  consubstantiality  of  the  Son  to  the  Father,  or  the  pro- 
cession of  the  Holy  Ghost  from  the  Father  and  the  Son, — 
Filioque^ — is  expressed  in  terms  as  clear,  as  intelligible,  and  as 
unequivocal  as  in  the  creed  ?  It  will  not  be  enough  to  adduce 
passages  which  teach  or  imply  one  or  the  other  of  these  doc- 
trines, but  he  must  adduce  passages  which  teach  them  as  ex- 
pressly, in  a  manner  as  clear  and  intelligible,  as  they  are  taught 
in  the  creed ;  for  his  assumption  is,  that  they  are  expressed  in 
the  Sacred  Scriptures  in  a*  manner  as  clear  and  intelligible  as 
they  can  be  in  human  language.  Adduce  the  passages,  if  you 
please.  You,  as  an  Episcopahan,  are  bound  to  admit  infant 
baptism  as  an  article  of  the  Christian  faith.  Do  you  find  this 
expressed  in  the  Bible  in  a  manner  "  as  clear  and  intelligible  as 
human  language  can  make  it  ? "  If  so,  why  have  you  not  been 
able,  long  ere  this,  to  settle  the  dispute  with  your  Baptist 
brethren,  who  have  as  much  reverence  for  the  Bible  as  you 
have,  are  as  learned,  and  no  doubt  as  honest  ?  If  the  articles 
of  Christian  faith  be  expressed  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures  in  pro- 
positions as  clear  and  intelligible  as  language  can  make  them, 
how  happens  it  that  men  dispute  more  about  their  sense  as 
contained  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures  than  they  do  about  their 
sense  as  drawn  out  and  defined  in  the  creed?  Is  there  an 
article  of  faith  held  to  be  fundamental  by  the  Episcopal  Ob- 
server that  has  not  been  disputed  on  what  has  been  conceived 
to  be  the  authority  of  Scripture  itself?  Yet  all  is  in  Scripture 
as  clear  and  as  intelhgible  as  human  language  can  make  it! 
Who  is  at  a  loss  to  know  what  the  Catholic  Church  means  by 
her  decisions  ?  Who  questions  the  sense  of  the  dogma  as  given 
in  her  definition  of  it  ?  If  she  can  define  an  article  of  faith  so 
as  to  end  all  dispute  concerning  its  sense,  so  far  as  she  defines 
it,  it  follows  that  arti(;les  of  faith  can  be  expressed  in  language, 


76  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

—  for  her  definitions  are  expressed  in  language, — so  afa  to 
preclude  uncertainty  as  to  their  meaning.  But  this  cannot 
be  said  of  the  articles  of  faith  as  expressed  and  arranged  in  the 
Sacred  Scriptures,  because  men  have  doubted  and  disputed 
from  the  first,  and  do  now  doubt  and  dispute,  as  to  what 
they  are,*  as  is  proved  by  the  number  of  ancient  sects,  and  the 
some  five  hundred  or  more  Protestant  sects  still  extant;  and 
also  by  the  violent  controversy,  concerning  what  the  writer  in 
the  Observer  must  regard  as  fundamentals,  now  raging  in  his 
own  Church,  both  in  this  country  and  in  England.  Nay,  the 
Scriptures  themselves  are  express  against  the  rash  assumption 
of  the  Observer.  "  And  account,"  says  St.  Peter,  "  the  long- 
suffering  of  our  Lord  is  salvation,  as  also  our  most  dear  brother 
Paul,  according  to  the  wisdom  given  him,  hath  written  to  you ; 
as  also  in  all  his  epistles,  speaking  in  them  of  these  things,  in 
which  there  are  certain  things  hard  to  be  understood,  which  the 
unlearned  and  unstable  wrest,  as  they  do  also  the  other  Scrip- 
tures, to  their  own  destruction." — 2  Pet.  iii.  15,  16.  This  is  to 
the  point.  The  Scriptures,  according  to  their  own  declaration, 
do  contain  things  hard  to  be  understood,  and  which  the  un- 
learned wrest  to  their  own  destruction  ;  aud  these  are  not  unes- 
sentials,  because  their  misinterpretation  involves  the  destruction 
of  those  who  misinterpret  them.  Where  is  the  intelligence, 
where  is  the  conscience,  of  this  rash  writer?  Has  he  no 
reverence  for  truth,  no  fear  of  God  before  his  eyes,  that  he 
hesitates  not  to  give  the  lie  to  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  to  affirm 
what  is  so  obviously  untrue  ?  Let  him  show  as  much  unanim- 
ity among  the  aforesaid  five  hundred  or  more  Protestant  sects, 
who  all  hold  the  Bible  to  be  the  word  of  God,  and  profess  to 
take  it  as  their  rule  of  faith  and  practice,  concerning  what  he 
himself  holds  to  be  fundamentals,  as  we  can  show  him  among 
Catholics  concerning  the  meaning  of  the  articles  of  faith  the 
Church  has  defined,  and  we  will  listen  to  his  assertion,  that  the 
revelation  of  God,  as  contained  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures, — for 
this  is  his  meaning, — is  "  as  clear  and  intelligible  as  human 
language  can  make  it ; "  but  till  then,  we  recommend  him  to 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  77 

moderate  his  tone,  and  meditate  daily  on  the  solemn  fact  that  a 
judgment  awaits  iis,  and  we  must  all  give  an  account  for  all 
our  thoughts,  words,  and  deeds.  An  induction  contradicted  by 
glaring  and  lamentable  facts  is  inadmissible ;  and  such  is  his, 
that  the  revelation  of  God,  as  expressed  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures, 
is  "  as  clear  and  intelligible  as  human  language  can  make  it." 
We  admit  the  revelation  to  be  perfectly  intelligible  in  the  way 
and  manner,  and  by  the  means,  intended  by  the  Revealer ;  but 
in  the  way  and  manner  asserted  by  the  Observer,  we  deny  its 
intelhgibleness,  as  must  every  honest  man  who  has  seriously 
undertaken  to  interpret  the  Holy  Scriptures  by  the  aid  of  pri- 
vate reason  alone. 

The  writer  in  the  Observer  asserts  that  we  assume  "  that  a 
human  interpreter  can  make  it  (divine  revelation)  plain."  We 
assume  no  such  thing ;  and  moreover,  if  he  is  capable  of  un- 
derstanding, in  any  degree,  his  mother  tongue,  and  has  read 
our  article  through,  he  knows  that  we  not  only  do  not,  but, 
with  our  general  doctrine,  that  we  could  not.  Does  he  not 
know,  that,  throughout  the  article,  we  are  attempting,  among 
other  things,  to  estabhsh  the  utter  incompetency  of  a  merely 
human  interpreter  ?  Does  he  not  know  that  we  contend  for 
the  competency  of  the  Church  to  interpret  or  declare  the  reve- 
lation of  God,  only  on  the  ground  that  she  has  the  promise  of 
the  superhuman,  the  supernatural,  guidance  and  assistance  of 
the  Holy  Ghost?  Does  he  not  know,  that,  according  to  all 
Cathohcs,  it  is  not  the  Humanity  of  the  Church,  but  the  Di- 
\anity,  whose  Spouse  she  is,  that  decides  in  her  decisions,  and 
in  her  interpretations  is  the  interpreter?  Prove  us  wrono-  in 
holding  this,  if  you  can  ;  but  do  not  assert  that  we  assume, 
either  consciously  or  unconsciously,  that  the  revelation  of  God 
can  be  made  plain  by  a  mere  human  interpreter.  It  was  not 
for  a  human  interpreter  we  contended,  but  for  a  divine  inter- 
preter ;  and  our  argument  was  to  prove,  that,  without  a  divine 
interpreter  of  divine  revelation,  it  is  impossible  to  elicit  an  act 
of  faith.  Will  the  Episcopal  Observer  remember  this  ?  The 
folly  and  absurdity  it  ascribes  to  us,  of  contending  for  a  human 


78  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

interpreter,  we  leave  to  Low-Churchmen  and  their  dearly  be- 
loved children  and  grandchildren,  the  No-Churchmen. 

The  Observer  also  charges  us  with  assuming,  "  that,  unless 
the  nice  theological  shades  of  meaning  in  God's  word  be  ap- 
preciated, one  cannot  be  saved."  There  is  little  pleasure  in 
replying  to  an  opponent  who  has  yet  to  learn  the  simplest  ele- 
ments of  the  matters  in  debate,  and  on  which  he  affects  to 
speak  as  a  master.  The  writer  in  the  Observer  does  not  ap- 
pear to  have  ever  read  a  single  elementary  work  on  theology. 
He  appears  to  be  wholly  ignorant  of  an}'-  distinction  between 
faith  and  theology.  We  said  not  one  word  about  "  nice  the- 
ological shades  of  meaning ; "  we  neither  said,  nor  implied  in 
anything  we  said,  that  theology  is  at  all  necessary  to  salvation. 
We  spoke  oi  faith  as  the  condition  sine  qua  non  of  salvation, 
we  admit,  but  not  of  theology  ;  and  we  contended  that  the  feith 
must  be  embraced  in  its  purity  and  integrity,  or  one  cannot  be 
saved :  but  not  that  one  cannot  be  saved  unless  he  appreciates 
the  nice  distinctions  of  theology.  Theology  and  its  distinc- 
tions belong  to  science,  a  science  constructed  by  human  reason 
from  principles  derived  from  the  light  of  nature  and  the  super- 
natural revelation  made  immediately  to  faith.  It  is  useful,  be- 
cause, in  the  ordinary  course  of  divine  providence,  we  cannot 
have  faith,  propagate,  preserve,  and  defend  faith,  without  it; 
for  by  it,  as  says  St.  Augustine,  Fides  saluberrima,  quce  ad 
veram  beatitudinem  ducit,  gipiitur,  defenditur^  roboratur.* 
Theology  is  necessary  or  useful  only  as  subservient  to  faith  ; 
but  faith  is  indispensable  to  salvation,  as  says  the  blessed  Apos- 
tle, "Without  faith  it  is  impossible  to  please  God;"  and 
whoso  does  not  please  God,  we  take  it,  is  not  in  the  way  of 
salvation.  As  to  distinctions  or  nice  shades  of  meaning  in  faith, 
we  said  nothing  about  them,  for  we  were  not  aware  of  their 
existence.  Faith  is  one,  a  whole,  and  must  be  embraced  in  its 
purity  and  integrity,  or  it  is  not  embraced  at  all. 

"  But  it  is  derogatory  to  the  character  of  God  and  the  inter- 
ests of  rehgion,"  says  the  writer  in  the  Observer^  "  to  say  that 

*  Lib.  XIV.  De  Trin.  Cap.  1 


VERSUS   THE    CHUECH.  79 

the  exo.ct  mind  of  the  Spirit  must  in  every  point  in  revelation 
be  fully  seen  and  acknowledged,  as  the  condition  of  being  saved." 
On  what  authority  is  this  said  ?  Does  he  deny  faith  to  be  the 
condition  sine  qua  non  of  salvation  ?  Of  course  not,  for  we 
assert  it  in  our  article,  and  he  takes  no  exception  to  our  asser- 
tion. Must  not  this  be  faith  in  what  the  Holy  Ghost  has  re- 
vealed, that  is,  in  the  revelation  Almighty  God  has  made  ? 
Has  not  Almighty  God  made  belief  of  this  revelation  a  necessa- 
ry condition  of  salvation  ?  If  so,  has  he  made  it  necessary  to 
believe  the  whole,  or  ouly  a  part  ?  In  its  exact  sense,  or  in  an 
inexact  sense  ?  If  you  say  a  part  is  not  necessary  to  be  believed, 
will  you  tell  us  what  part  ?  Will  you  be  so  obhging  as  to 
favor  us  with  a  specification,  on  divine  authority,  of  the  portions 
of  revelation  which  we  have  the  permission  of  the  Holy  Ghost 
to  disbelieve  or  not  beheve  ? 

That  it  is  necessary  to  beheve  the  whole  revelation,  as  the 
condition  sine  qua  non  of  salvation,  is  evident  from  the  very 
definition  we  gave  of  faith,  namely,  that  it  is  "  a  theological 
virtue,  which  consists  in  believing aZ^  the  truths  God  has  revealed, 
on  the  veracity  of  God  alone."  Does  the  Observer  deny  this 
definition  of  faith  ?  If  it  does,  why  has  it  not  said  so,  and  re- 
futed it  by  refuting  the  arguments  by  which  we  attempted  to 
sustain  it  ?  and,  since  its  purpose  was  to  have  the  jileasure  of 
refuting  us,  why  did  it  not  give  and  sustain  a  definition  in  op- 
position to  ours  ?  Was  it  a  suflBcient  refutation  of  us  for  it  to 
pronounce,  as  it  does,  that,  in  that  portion  of  the  article  in 
which  we  give  this  definition,  we  "  enter  into  a  bog  and  floun- 
der till  we  reach  the  opposite  side  ? "  Was  it  afraid,  if  it  fol- 
lowed us,  it  would  itself  sink  in  the  "  bog,"  stick  fast  in  the 
"  morass  ? "  or  was  it  only  the  pleasure,  not  the  pain,  of  re- 
futing us  it  promised  itself?  If  faith  consist  in  believing  all 
the  truths  Almighty  God  has  revealed, — and  dare  the  Observer 
assert  that  it  does  not  ? — and  if  faith  be,  as  the  blessed  Apostle 
declares,  the  condition  without  which  we  cannot  be  saved,  it  fol- 
lows necessarily  that  the  whole  mind  of  the  Spirit,  so  far  as 
revealed,  must   be  believed,  as  the  condition  of  being  saved. 


80  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

Will  the  writer  in  the  Observe?'  deny  this  ?  Let  him  do  it, 
and  he  may  possibly  find  himself  in  "  a  bog "  to  which  there 
is  no  "  other  side." 

But  it  may  be  the  writer  in  the  Observer  does  not  mean  to 
assert,  that  "  it  is  derogatory  to  the  character  of  God  and  in- 
jurious to  the  interests  of  religion"  to  say,  that  all  the  truths 
Almighty  God  has  revealed  must  be  explicitly  beheved,  as  the 
condition  of  being  saved,  but  simply  that  it  is  derogatory,  &c., 
to  say  they  must  be  explicitly  believed  in  their  exact  sense,  as 
they  lie  in  the  mind  of  the  Holy  Ghost.  We  say  explicitly 
believed,  for  this  is  what  he  must  mean  by  being  "fully  seen 
and  acknowledged."  What  he  means  to  object  to  is  the  as- 
sertion, that  the  exact  mind  of  the  Spirit  must  be  believed  as 
the  condition  sine  qua  non  of  salvation.  "  The  exact  mind  of 
the  Spirit "  must  mean  the  entire  revelation  Almighty  God  has 
made,  in  its  exact  sense,  or,  as  we  expressed  ourselves,  in  its 
genuine  sense.  Then  we  can  understand  by  the  exact  mind 
of  the  Spirit  neither  more  nor  less  than  "  the  pure  word  of 
God."  Then  it  is  derogatory  to  the  character  of  God  and  in- 
jurious to  the  interests  of  religion  to  say,  that  the  pure  word  of 
God — the  revelation  in  its  purity  and  integrity — must  be  be- 
lieved as  the  condition  of  being  saved.  Then,  in  order  not  to 
derogate  from  the  character  of  God,  and  not  to  injure  the  in- 
terests of  religion,  we  must  say,  the  impure  word  of  God,  that 
is,  the  word  of  God  corrupted  by  a  greater  or  less  admixture  of 
falsehood  and  error,  is  sufficient,  all  that  it  is  necessary  to  be- 
lieve, in  order  to  be  saved,  or  to  have  that  faith  without  which 
"  it  is  impossible  to  please  God  !"  Is  the  Ejnscopal  Observer 
prepared  to  adopt  this  conclusion  ?  It  must  adopt  it.  It  will 
not  allow  us  to  insist  on  the  exact  mind  of  the  Spirit.  But  if 
we  do  not  take  the  exact  mind  of  the  Spirit,  we  must  take  the 
inexact  mind.  The  inexact  mind,  so  far  forth  as  inexact,  is 
not  the  mind  of  the  Spirit  at  all, — is  not  the  word  of  God, — 
is  not  truth,  but  falsehood,  and  therefore  of  the  Devil,  who  is  a 
liar  from  the  beginning,  and  the  father  of  lies.  The  inexact 
mind  of  the  Spirit  is  the  impure  or  corrupt  word  of  God,  the 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  81 

word  of  God  and  the  words  of  the  Devil  combined.  If  it  be 
derogatory  to  the  character  of  God  and  injurious  to  the  inter- 
ests of  rehgion  to  insist  on  the  necessity  to  salvation  of  faith  in 
the  pure  word  of  God,  it  must  be  honorable  to  the  character 
of  God  and  advantageous  to  the  interests  of  religion  to  contend 
that  behef  of  the  impure  word,  the  corrupt  word,  the  word  of 
God  combined  with  the  words  of  the  Devil,  is  sufl&cient  as  the 
condition  of  being  saved !  A  very  comforting  doctrine  to  all 
classes  of  errorists  ;  for  they  all  hold  the  truth,  or  some  portion 
of  truth,  but  mixed  with  error, — that  is,  in  an  inexact,  a  false, 
or  a  corrupt  sense.  The  Ohserverh  own  church  defines  the 
visible  Church  of  Christ  to  be  "  a  congregation  of  faithful  men, 
in  the  which  the  pure  word  of  God  is  preached."  Art.  XIX. 
We  suppose  they  who  preach  the  pure  word  of  God  preach  it 
because  they  hold  its  belief  to  be  necessary  as  the  condition  of 
being  saved.  The  Church  of  Christ,  then,  inasmuch  as  it 
preaches,  and,  we  presume,  insists  on,  the  x>^ire  word  of  God, 
or  the  exact  mind  of  the  Spirit,  as  necessary  to  salvation,  does 
that  which  is  "  derogatory  to  the  character  of  God  and  injurious 
to  the  interests  of  religion  !"  Happily,  however,  for  the  writer 
in  the  Observer^  his  church  is  not  obnoxious  to  this  charge  ;  for 
it  is  unquestionably  innocent  of  the  sin  of  preaching  the  pure 
word  of  God. 

After  all,  this  is  rather  a  singular  doctrine  for  a  Protestant  to 
avow^  however  consistent  it  may  be  for  him  to  entertain  it.  The 
charge  against  the  Church  of  Rome  by  the  pseudo-reformers 
was  not  that  it  did  not  hold  the  word  of  God,  but  that  it  had 
ceased  to  hold  it  in  its  purity.  It  had  corrupted  the  word  of 
God,  not  the  written  word,  not  the  text,  but  the  sense,  the  doc- 
trine, that  is,  "  the  mind  of  the  Spirit,"  and  therefore  had  be- 
come a  corrupt  church,  in  the  bosom  of  which  salvation  had  be- 
come impossible,  or,  at  least,  exceedingly  doubtful.  On  this 
ground  they  pretended  to  separate  from  its  communion,  and  on 
this  ground  their  children  have  generally  attempted  to  vindicate 
their  separation.  But  the  Episcopal  Observer,  it  seems,  aban- 
dons this  ground,  and  gives  the  Reformers  a  very  unfiHal  blow. 

4* 


82  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

According  to  this  modern  Protestant,  the  fact  that  a  church  has 
corrupted  the  word  of  God,  and  preaches  not  the  pure  word,  but 
the  impure  word,  is  rather  to  its  credit,  and  should  be  a  motive 
for  seeking  or  remaining  in  its  communion,  instead  of  a  motive 
for  separating  from  it.  The  only  good  ground  of  separation, 
if  we  accept  his  doctrine,  would  be  the  fact  that  the  Church 
preaches  the  pure  word  of  God,  and  commands  belief  in  the 
exact  mind  of  the  Spirit,  as  the  condition  of  salvation.  From 
such  a  church  it  must  be  one's  duty  to  separate,  because  such  a 
church  derogates  from  the  character  of  God,  and  injures  the 
interests  of  religion.  Perhaps  it  was  on  this  ground,  after  all, 
that  the  Reformers  separated  from  the  communion  of  the  Holy 
See,  and  on  this  ground  that  Protestants  generally  remain  sep- 
arate from  that  communion. 

But  the  Observer  not  only  protests  against  the  necessity  of 
belief  in  the  exact  mind  of  the  Spirit,  but  it  contends  that  the 
exact  mind  of  the  Spirit  cannot  possibly  be  communicated  to 
us.  "  Thoughts  may  be  communicated,"  it  says,  "  by  a  written 
or  spoken  language ;  but  perfectly,  entirely,  unmistakably,  by 
neither.  To  this  rule  the  thoughts  of  God  form  no  exception. 
When  communicated  to  erring  men,  they  come  clothed  under 
the  guise  of  the  erring  representative,  human  language  ;  and  of 
necessity,  therefore,  are  liable,  in  some  of  their  shades,  to  be 
misconceived."  So  Almighty  God  himself  cannot,  if  he  will, 
teach  us  the  exact  truth,  nor  make  to  us.  a  revelation  of  his  will 
which  we  may  believe  without  mixture  of  error  !  The  truth  as 
it  is  in  God  cannot  be  communicated  to  us ;  we  can  never  re- 
ceive what  God  is  pleased  to  reveal,  ^^ perfectly,  entirely,  unmis- 
takably ;"  but  must  always  misconceive  it  to  a  greater  or  less 
extent,  and  substitute,  for  the  mind  of  the  Spirit,  our  own  mind, 
— for  the  word  of  God,  our  own  words,  or  the  words  of  the 
Devil !  And  yet,  the  Observer  tells  us,  the  revelation  God  has 
made  us  is  so  easy  of  comprehension,  "  that  the  wayfaring  man, 
though  a  fool,  shall  not  err  therein^  Nevertheless,  Almighty 
God  himself  cannot  make  a  revelation  that  can  be  perfectly  re- 
ceived, that  can  be  embraced  without  mistakes  and  misconcep- 


VERSUS   THE    CHURCH.  83 

tioifo.  It  is  a  convenience,  sometimes,  when  we  wish  to  secure 
the  '"pleasure"  of  refuting  an  opponent,  to  have  short  mem- 
ories and  flexible  principles. 

But,  according  to  the  Observer^  we  can  never,  even  by  the 
help  of  Almight}:  God,  embrace  the  word  of  God  in  its  purity 
and  integrity ;  for,  coming  to  us  "  clad  in  the  defectible  exterior 
of  human  language,"  it  must,  "  by  a  law  of  necemty,  be  un- 
derstood differently  by  different  minds."  We  can  never  know 
precisely  what  it  is  God  requires  us  to  believe,  and  we  never 
can  believe  what  he  requires  us  to  believe,  without  mixing  with 
it  more  or  less  of  error  and  falsehood.  Be  it  so.  Will  the  Ob- 
server oblige  us,  then,  by  telling  us  how  far  we  may  combine 
with  the  word  of  God,  or  substitute  for  it,  our  own  words,  or 
those  of  the  Devil,  without  danger  to  the  soul  ?  Will  he  tell 
us,  on  divine  authority^  where  is  the  exact  boundaiy,  on  one 
side  of  which  mistakes  and  misconceptions,  errors  and  false- 
hoods, are  harmless,  and  on  the  other  side  of  which  they  are 
destructive?  Will  he  give  us  some  rule  by  which  we  may 
always  know  whether  we  are  on  the  right  side  or  the  wrong 
side  ?  The  rule  is  important,  and  we  pray  this  Protestant  the- 
ologian, who  proposes  to  himself  the  very  great  pleasure  of  re- 
futing us,  to  give  us  the  slight  pleasure  of  furnishing  us  this 
rule,  so  that  we  may  not  only  know  whether  he  really  has  re- 
futed us,  but  also  whether  we  have  more  or  less  error  than  we 
may  with  safety  entertain. 

But  if  we  cannot  receive  the  revelation  of  God  without  mis- 
taking or  misconceiving  it,  how  is  it  possible  for  us  to  know 
whether  we  have  the  faith  Almighty  God  requires  of  us  or  not  ? 
If  we  mistake  on  one  point  why  may  we  not  on  another? 
And  if  we  are  always  liable  to  err,  if  even  Almighty  God  can- 
not set  us  right,  because  he  can  speak  to  us  only  through  hu- 
man language,  which  is  always  and  necessarily  a  distorting  me- 
dium, where  is  faith,  or  even  the  possibility  of  faith  ?  Faith  is 
to  believe  without  doubting,  and  is  possible  only  where  there  is 
absolute  certainty.  But  where  there  is  a  liability  to  err,  nay, 
a  necessity  to  mistake  and  misconceive,  there  is  and  can  be  no 


84  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

absolute  certainty,  but  is  and  necessarily  must  be  doubt,  and, 
therefore,  no  faith.  If  the  Observer  is  right  in  its  doctrine,  faith 
is  impossible.  It  clearly  shows,  then,  that,  on  its  premises,  faith, 
properly  so  called,  is  impossible, — the  very  conclusion  to  which, 
we  stated,  in  advance,  we  intended  to  force  it  and  all  who  reject 
the  authority  of  the  Catholic  Church  as  the  witness  and  ex- 
pounder of  God's  ^vord.  Yet  it  claims  "  the  pleasure"  of  having 
refuted  us  ! 

We  can  understand  now,  why,  in  his  synopsis  of  our  argu- 
ment^ the  writer  in  the  Observer  leaves  out  our  definition  of 
faith,  and  our  position  that  what  we  are  to  believe  is  truth^  not 
falsehood.  If  faith  be  to  beheve  without  doubting,  it  is  not 
possible  without  absolute  certainty,  and  absolute  certainty  is 
possible  only  in  the  case  of  absolute  truth ;  and  absolute  truth 
he  foresaw  he  was  not  likely  to  get,  without  going  to  Rome ; 
for,  without  going  to  Rome,  he  knew  he  could,  at  best,  have 
only  truth  mixed  with  falsehood.  To  controvert  our  definition 
of  faith,  or  to  refute  the  arguments  by  which  we  sustained  our 
position,  that  what  we  are  to  believe  is  "  truth,  not  falsehood," 
was  no  easy  matter,  and  not  safe  to  be  attempted ;  and  yet  he 
must  have  the  pleasure  of  refuting  us. 

The  whole  controversy  between  Catholics  and  Protestants 
turns  on  the  questions  here  involved.  Catholics  say  that  Al- 
mighty God  has  made  us  a  revelation,  and  commanded  us  to 
believe  it,  without  doubting,  in  its  integrity  and  genuine  sense, 
as  the  condition  sine  qua  non  of  salvation.  Protestants  also  say 
God  has  made  us  a  revelation,  and  commanded  us  to  believe 
it  without  doubting,  i\s  the  condition  sine  qua  non  of  salvation, 
but,  virtually,  if  not  expressly,  that  he  does  not  command  us  to 
believe  it  in  its  integrity  and  genuine  sense,  but  only  so  much 
of  it  as  commends  itself  to  our  own  minds  and  hearts,  and  in 
the  sense  in  lohich  it  pleases  us  to  understand  it.  They  are 
obliged  to  say  this,  or  acknowledge  the  authority  of  the  Catholic 
Oliurch,  and  condemn  themselves,  as  not  having  that  faith  with- 
out which  they  cannot  be  saved. 

The  presumption,  to  say  the  least,  is  in  favor  of  the  Catholics  • 


VERSUS   THE    CHURCH.  85 

for  we  cannot  reasonably  suppose  that  the  Holy  Ghost  reveals 
what  he  does  not  require  us  to  believe,  nor  that  he  can  consent 
that  we  should  believe  his  word  in  any  sense  but  his  own. 
The  Protestants  are,  then,  presumptively  in  the  wrong,  and 
consequently,  the  onus  probandi  rests  on  them.  They  can 
justify  themselves  only  by  producing,  on  divine  authority,  a 
specification  of  the  portions  of  God's  word  they  have  the  per- 
mission of  the  Holy  Ghost  to  disbelieve  or  not  believe,  according 
to  their  own  caprice  ;  and  also  the  permission  of  the  Holy  Ghost 
to  believe  his  word  in  their  own  sense,  rather  than  in  his.  God 
has  made  us  a  revelation  ;  this  they  admit,  as  well  as  we.  He 
has  commanded  us  to  believe  it ;  this  they  admit  as  well  as  we. 
He  has  made  belief  of  it  a  necesssary  condition  of  salvation  ;  this 
they  dare  not  deny.  What,  then,  is  the  fair  presumption  from 
these  premises  ?  Is  it  not,  that  God  commands  belief  in  his 
revelation  in  its  purity  and  integrity  as  the  condition  of  salva- 
tion? Unquestionably.  Then,  unless  you  have  his  authority 
for  saying  that  he  neither  requires  you  to  believe  all  he  has 
revealed,  nor  to  beheve  what  you  do  believe  in  its  true  sense, 
you  are  convicted  of  not  having  the  faith  he  commands,  unless 
you  actually  believe  his  whole  revelation,  and  in  its  true  sense. 

Moreover,  the  ground  on  which  you  are  to  beheve  this  reve- 
lation is  the  veracity  of  God  alone.  Now,  this  ground  is  suf- 
ficient ground  of  faith  in  all  that  God  has  revealed,  and  you 
can  with  no  more  propriety  refuse  to  believe  one  portion  of  it 
than  another.  To  refuse  to  believe  this  revelation  is  to  make 
God  a  liar,  and  you  make  him  a  liar  in  refusing  to  believe  one 
article,  as  much  as  you  would  in  refusing  to  beheve  the  whole- 
You  must,  then,  beheve  the  whole,  or  you  make  God,  in  your 
own  mind,  a  liar ;  and  are  you  prepared  to  maintain  that  he 
who  charges  God  with  falsehood,  which  is  to  blaspheme  the 
Holy  Ghost,  is  in  the  way  of  salvation  ? 

So  must  you  also  believe  the  revelation  in  God's  sense  ;  for 
it  is  only  in  his  sense  that  it  is  his  word.  If  you  put  a  mean- 
ing upon  my  words  different  from  the  meaning  I  put  upon 
them,  they  cease  to  be  my  words,  and  become  yours.     So,  when 


86  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER. 

you  put  a  meaning  upon  God's  word  different  from  the  meaning 
lie  puts  upon  it,  it  ceases  to  be  his  word,  and  becomes  your 
word,  and  you  believe  then  the  truth  not  as  it  is  in  God,  but 
as  it  is  in  you.  You  must,  then,  beheve  the  revelation  in  its 
true  sense,  or  you  do  not  believe  the  revelation  Almighty  God 
has  made.  Is  it  not  remarkable  that  Protestants  seem  never  to 
be  aware  of  this  ? 

Again,  God  commands  faith  in  his  revelation.  But  faith  is 
to  believe  without  doubting,  and  is,  as  we  have  seen,  possible 
only  on  condition  of  infalHble  evidence,  which  leaves  no  room 
for  doubt,  but  gives  absolute  certainty.  The  certainty  of  faith, 
though  different  in  kind,  must  be  equal  in  degree  to  the  cer- 
tainty of  knowledge,  or  it  is  not  faith.  But  this  certainty  is  not 
possible  in  case  of  error  or  falsehood.  Error  or  falsehood  can- 
not be  infalhbly  evidenced ;  for,  if  it  could,  it  would  not  be  error 
or  falsehood,  but  truth.  It  follows,  therefore,  that  the  requisite 
degree  of  evidence  to  elicit  faith  is  possible  only  in  the  case  of 
absolute  truth.  But  the  revelation  of  God,  when  misinterpreted, 
when  taken  not  in  its  exact  sense,  is  not  absolute  truth,  and 
therefore  cannot  be  so  evidenced  to  the  mind  as  to  elicit  faith. 
But  we  must  have  faith,  or  be  eternally  damned.  Then  you 
must  take  the  revelation  in  its  exact  sense,  or  not  be  saved. 

Do  you  reply,  that  faith,  in  this  sense,  is  impossible,  because 
it  is  impossible  to  have  infaUible  certainty  of  the  exact  mind  of 
the  Spirit  ?  This  is  a  plain  begging  of  the  question.  Impos- 
sible, on  your  ground,  we  admit ;  but  not,  therefore,  necessarily, 
on  every  ground.  Your  objection  merely  proves  that  you  can- 
not, as  Protestants,  elicit  an  act  of  faith,  which  is  what  we  con- 
tend ;  but  when  you  say  therefore  we  cannot  elicit  faith  at  all, 
you  assume  that  your  ground  is  the  true  and  only  ground, 
which  is  what  we  deny,  and  what  it  is  your  business  to  prove. 
Because  you  cannot  elicit  faith,  it  does  not  foDow  that  faith  can- 
not be  elicited.  God  has  commanded  it,  as  you  yourselves  dare 
not  deny  ;  but  God  cannot  command  what  is  impossible  ;  therer 
fore  faith  is  possible.  Then  the  fact  that  it  is  not  possible, 
on  your  ground,  only  proves  that  you  are  wrong. 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH. 


8Y 


One  of  the  objections  we  brought  against  the  Bible,  as  the 
witness  to  the  fact  of  revelation,  was,  that,  without  an  infallible 
authority,  distinct  from  the  Bible,  it  is  impossible  to  prove  the 
sufficiency  of  the  Scriptures.  We  contended,  for  several  rea- 
sons, which  we  gave,  that  they  who  take  the  Bible,  as  inter- 
preted by  private  reason  alone,  for  the  only  and  sufficient  rule 
of  faith,  are  bound  to  prove  that  their  rule  is  sufficient  from  the 
Sacred  Scriptures  themselves.  But  this  they  cannot  do,  for 
the  Scriptures  nowhere  assert  their  own  sufficiency.  The  Ob- 
server contends  that  they  are  not  bound  to  prove  the  sufficiency 
of  the  Scriptures,  but  that  we  are  bound  to  prove  their  insuffi- 
ciency !  But  \i  nowhere  takes  up  or  replies  to  our  objections, 
and  nowhere  shows  on  what  principle  we  are  bound  to  prove  a 
negative.  Doubtless,  if  we  deny  a  proposition,  we  are  bound  to 
justify  our  denial  by  adducing  a  good  reason  for  it;  but  in  most 
cases  it  is  sufficient  to  allege  the  fact  that  the  affirmative  propo- 
sition is  not  proved.  Protestants  assert  the  sufficiency  of  the 
Scriptures  ;  it  is  their  business  to  prove  that  sufficiency,  and  by 
divine  authority,  too, — a  thing  they  never  have  done,  and  a 
thing  they  know  perfectly  well,  if  they  know  anything  of  the 
subject,  they  never  can  do.  By  what  right  do  they  assume  a 
position,  without  offering  a  single  particle  of  evidence  appropri- 
ate in  the  case  to  prove  it,  and  then  call  upon  us  to  disprove  it  ? 
Is  rational  culture  so  neglected  among  Protestants,  and  even 
Protestant  theologians,  that  they  have  no  more  sense  of  sound 
reasoning  than  this  implies  ? 

But  we  went  further,  and  disproved  the  sufficiency  of  the 
Scriptures,  which  was  more  than  our  argument  required.  Faith 
is  to  believe,  without  doubting,  all  the  truths  Almighty  God 
has  revealed,  and,  therefore,  is  possible  only  on  condition  that 
we  have  absolute  certainty  that  what  we  receive  as  the  revela- 
tion of  God  is  his  revelation,  and  the  whole  of  his  revelation,  as 
we  proved  before  and  have  now  proved  again.  The  -witness, 
to  be  adequate,  sufficient,  must,  then,  testify  to  the  fact  that 
the  matter  beheved  or  to  be  believed  is  the  revelation,  and  the 
whole  revelat'on,     Now,  to  this  last  fact,  namely,  that  they 


88  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

contain  the  whole  revelation,  or  the  whole  word  of  God,  the 
Scriptures  do  not  testify.  Therefore,  they  are  insufficient,  for 
this  very  reason,  if  for  no  other.  This  is  the  argument  ad- 
duced in  our  article,  and,  certainly,  before  the  Observer  can 
legitimately  claim  the  pleasure  of  having  refuted  us,  and  the 
right  to  assert  the  sufficiency  of  the  Scriptures,  it  is  bound  to 
set  this  argument  aside.     But  it  does  not  even  notice  it. 

The  Observer^  we  apprehend,  does  not  understand  what  a 
witness  to  the  fact  of  revelation  means.  He  seems  to  reason 
on  the  supposition,  that,  when  we  contended  for  a  witness  to 
the  fact  of  revelation,  we  meant  merely  that  we  must  have  a 
witness  to  the  fact  that  God  has  made  a  revelation.  We  as- 
sure him  this  was  not  our  meaning.  We  mean  by  the  fact  of 
revelation,  not  simply  the  fact  that  God  has  made  a  revelation, 
but  that  he  has  revealed  this  or  that  is  a  feet ;  and  we  mean  by 
a  witness  to  the  fact  of  revelation,  not  merely  a  witness  to  rev- 
elation in  general,  but  to  each  particular  point  of  the  revelation. 
Assume,  for  instance,  that  the  mystery  of  the  Trinity  is  the 
point  in  question.  The  ground  of  faith  in  this  mystery  is  the 
veracity  of  God  revealing  it.  But  before  we  can  know  that 
we  have  God's  veracity  for  the  truth  of  this  adorable  mystery, 
we  must  know  that  God  has  revealed  it,  that  is,  the  fact  that 
he  has  revealed  it.  Now,  the  witness  we  demand  is  a  witness 
to  this  fact,  and  to  the  like  fact  in  every  other  case ;  and  un- 
less we  have  such  a  witness — an  infallible  witness,  too — in 
each  particular  case,  we  have  and  can  have  no  faith.  Does 
the  Observer  understand  this  ?  Will  it  deny  that  a  witness, 
and  an  infallible  witness,  in  the  sense  here  defined,  is  the  con- 
dition sine  qua  non  of  faith  ?  Can  it  say  that  God  has  re- 
vealed this  or  that  article  of  faith,  if  it  have  no  witness  to  the 
fact  that  God  has  revealed  it?  Can  it  say  it  with  absolute 
certainty  without  an  infiiUible  witness  ?  and  if  it  cannot  say 
with  infallible  certainty  that  God  has  revealed  it,  can  it  be- 
lieve, without  doubting,  that  he  has  revealed  it  ?  No  man  has 
faith,  till  he  can  say  with  St.  Augustine,  "  O  God,  if  I  am  de- 
ceived. Thou  hast  deceived  me,"  and  this,  too,  in  every  single 


VERSUS   THE    CHURCH.  89 

article  of  faith.  Who  can  say  this,  unless  he  has  infalhble 
evidence  that  the  particular  article,  which  is  in  question,  is  act- 
ually God's  word  ? 

We  must,  then,  have  the  witness,  or  faith  is  impossible. 
What  is  this  witness  ?  We  stated  that  it  must  be,  1.  Reason  ; 
2.  The  Bible ;  3.  Private  illumination  ;  or,  4.  The  Apostolic 
ministry,  or  JEcclesia  docens.  We  demonstrated  that  it  could 
not  be  the  first  three,  and,  therefore,  inferred  that  it  must  be  the 
fourth,  or  we  have  no  witness.  The  Observer  nowhere  meets 
our  arguments ;  but  merely  cavils  at  one  or  two  collateral 
points.  It  does  not  bring  out,  clearly  and  distinctly,  any  doc- 
trine of  its  own ;  but,  so  far  as  we  can  understand  its  loose 
statements,  it  assumes  that  the  witness  is  the  Bible,  interpreted, 
not  by  private  reason,  but  by  private  illumination,  or  what  he 
calls  "  the  internal  monitor."  We  prove  by  historical  testi- 
mony that  the  Scriptures  contain  the  revelation  of  God,  and 
by  the  internal  monitor  we  ascertain  its  sense. 

But,  1.  We  cannot,  by  historical  testimony,  prove  that  the 
Bible  contains  the  whole  revelation  of  God ;  and  yet,  assum- 
ing a  revelation  to  have  been  made,  and  belief  of  it  enjoined 
as  the  condition  of  being  saved,  we  can  demonstrate,  as  we 
have  shown,  by  reason,  that  it  is  necessary  to  beheve,  and  to 
know  that  we  beheve,  the  whole. 

2.  There  are  many  false  prophets  gone  out  into  the  world, 
and  we  are  not  to  believe  every  spirit,  but  to  try  the  spirits  if 
they  be  of  God. — 1  St.  John,  iv.  1.  There  must,  then,  be 
some  criterion  by  which  we  may  distinguish  the  true  from  the 
false.  This  cannot  be  the  internal  monitor,  because  that  is  pre- 
cisely what  we  are  to  try.  What  is  this  criterion  ?  The  bless- 
ed Apostle  tells  us.  "  We  are  of  God.  He  that  knoweth 
God  heareth  us.  He  that  is  not  of  God  heareth  not  us.  By 
this  we  know  the  spirit  of  truth  from  the  spirit  oi  error." — 
lb.  6.  If  you  have  the  spirit  of  truth,  you  hear  the  Apostles, 
that  is,  abide  in  the  Apostolic  doctrine  and  communion.  You 
must,  then,  prove  that  you  abide  in  the  Apostolic  doctrine  and 


90  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

communion,  before  you  have  pro\'ed  your  right  to  follow  your 
"  internal  monitor." 

3.  We  are  commanded  to  give  a  reason  to  them  that  ask  us 
of  tlie  hope  that  is  in  us.  But,  according  to  the  Observer  it- 
self, this  inward  witness  is  authority  only  for  the  individual  him- 
self, and,  therefore,  no  reason  to  be  assigned  to  others. 

4.  All  men  are  required  to  believe  the  revelation  God  has 
made,  on  pain  of  eternal  condemnation.  To  believe  the  reve- 
lation is  to  believe  it  in  its  integrity  and  genuine  sense.  But 
it  must  be  propounded  to  those  who  are  as  yet  unbelievers  in 
this  sense,  as  the  condition  of  their  believing  it.  Now,  it  must 
be  propounded  with  infallible  evidence  that  it  is  the  revelation 
of  God,  or  without  it.  If  without  it,  unbelievers  are  justifia- 
ble in  rejecting  it,  which  no  Christian  can  admit.  But  if  the 
sense  is  to  be  ascertained  only  by  the  inward  monitor  of  the 
individual,  it  cannot  be  propounded  with  the  infallible  evidence 
required,  for  this  evidence  must  be  evidence  to  the  revelation 
in  its  genuine  sense,  since  otherwise  that  which  is  evidenced 
would  not  be  the  word  of  God,  but  something  else, — the 
words  of  man,  or  of  the  Devil. 

5.  The  internal  monitor  is  the  Holy  Ghost.  Is  the  Holy 
Ghost  given  to  unbelievers  ?  If  you  say  yes,  we  demand  the 
proof,  which  the  Observer  admits  cannot  be  given.  If  you  say 
no,  then,  we  ask,  where  is  the  sin  of  unbelievers  in  that  they 
are  unbelievers  ?  The  revelation  is  not  credible,  save  in  its  true 
sense.  They  who  are  not  privately  illuminated  by  the  Holy 
Ghost  know  not  and  cannot  know  it  in  its  true  sense.  Then 
they  cannot  believe  it.  Yet  they  are,  by  all  Christian  theology, 
declared  sinners  in  consequence  of  their  unbelief.  Is  a  man  a 
sinner  for  not  doing  what  he  has  not  the  ability  to  do  ? 

6.  But  lastly,  the  practical  effects  of  this  doctrine  prove  that 
it  is  not  of  God.  It  paves  the  way  for  lawless  enthusiasm,  and 
the  introduction  of  all  manner  of  false  doctrines.  Every  en- 
thusiast may  allege  that  he  has  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  though 
what  he  teaches  is  as  ftilse  as  hell  and  wicked  as  the  Devil,  you 
have  no  means  of  convicting  him.     He  speaks  by  the  Holy 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  91 

Ghost ;  would  you  shut  the  mouth  of  the  Holy  Ghost  ?  He 
follows  the  Spirit ;  would  you  resist  the  Spirit  ?  Each  man  is 
the  Ecclesia  docens,  and  professes  to  speak  with  infallible  au- 
thority. What  will  you  do  ?  What  will  you  say  ?  Your 
mouth  is  shut.  Does  not  the  Spirit  witness  to  itself  ?  What 
right  have  you  to  oppose  your  Spirit  to  his  ?  Has  he  not  as 
high  authority  as  you  have  ?  You  say,  No ;  he  says,  Yes  ; 
and  how  are  you  to  prove  your  no  is  above  his  yes  ?  What  is 
to  decide  between  you  ?  The  Bible  ?  Not  so  fast.  Your 
rule  of  faith  is  the  Bible  interpreted  by  the  internal  monitor. 
He  appeals  to  the  Bible,  as  well  as  you  ;  and  the  question  is 
not,  whether  the  Bible  be  or  be  not  the  word  of  God,  but 
whether  he  or  you  have  its  genuine  sense.  What  does  the 
Bible  mean  ?  You,  on  the  authority  of  what  you  call  the  Holy 
Ghost,  say  it  means  this ;  he,  on  what  he  alleges  to  be  the 
same  authority,  says  it  means  that.  Which  of  you  is  right  ? 
What  is  to  decide  ?  Nothing.  You  cannot  convict  him,  nor 
he  you.  There  you  are,  eternally  at  loggerheads,  and  the  most 
damnable  heresies  are  rife  in  the  land,  and  ruining  the  people, 
boih  for  this  world  and  for  that  which  is  to  come.  This  is  one 
of  the  glorious  effects  of  your  "  glorious  Reformation  !"  Can  a 
doctrine,  leading  to  such  disastrous  consequences,  be  a  doctrine 
from  God  I  And  has  Almighty  God  provided  no  safer  rule  for 
the  instruction  of  his  children  in  that  faith  he  requires  them  to 
believe  as  the  condition  of  being  saved  ?  Out  upon  the  foul 
blasphemy  !  Say  it  not,  but  rather  go  and  sit  in  sackcloth  and 
ashes  at  the  foot  of  the  cross,  look  on  him  ye  have  crucified,  and 
weep  in  silence  over  your  folly  and  wickedness. 

The  Observer  complains  of  us,  that  we  assumed,  in  our  ar- 
gument, that  Protestants  admit  that  God  has  made  us  a  revela- 
tion, and  that  we  did  not  reason  with  them  as  if  they  were  Jews, 
Mahometans,  or  infidels.  Perhaps  we  were  wrong  in  this,  but 
it  will  do  us,  we  hope,  the  justice  to  acknowledge,  that  we  did 
not  assume  them  to  be  believers  in  the  revelation  of  God  ;  we 
only  assumed  that  they  profess  to  believe  it,  at  least,  some  por- 
tions of  it.     We  have  known  Protestants  too  long  and  too  in- 


92  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

timately  to  be  guilty  of  the  folly  of  inferring  their  belief  from 
their  profession.  We  hope  this  explanation  will  satisfy  the 
Observe!'^  and  induce  it  to  withdraw  its  complaint.  We  as- 
sumed that  Protestants  admit  that  God  has  made  us  a  revela- 
tion, and  that  the  Scriptures,  so  far  as  we  had  in  our  argument 
occasion  to  appeal  to  that  revelation,  contain  an  authentic  rec- 
ord of  it.  This  they  profess  ;  and  in  reasoning  with  them,  we 
supposed  it  would  be  more  respectful  to  take  them  at  their  pro- 
fession than  it  would  be  to  go  behind  it  for  their  actual  belief 
or  want  of  belief.  If,  however,  they  object  to  this,  prefer  to 
have  us  reason  with  them  as  if  they  were  infidels,  and  really 
believe  that  this  would  be  more  in  accordance  with  truth,  we 
will  hereafter  do  our  best  to  accommodate  them. 

On  one  point  the  Observer  seems  really  to  believe  that  it  has 
caught  us  in  a  difficulty,  and  its  antics  on  the  occasion  are  quite 
diverting.  We  contended  that  we  cannot  elicit  an  act  of  faith 
without  an  infallible  witness  to  the  fact  of  revelation,  and  that 
this  witness  cannot  be  reason,  the  Bible,  nor  private  illumina- 
tion, but  is  and  must  be  the  Apostolic  ministry.  On  this,  the 
Observer  breaks  out : — "  We  have,  then,  no  proof  of  the 
fact  of  revelation,  unless  we  can  find  it  in  the  testimony  of  the 
Apostolic  ministry.  Very  well,  Mr.  Brownson,  as  the  first 
important  matter  is  the  fact  that  we  have  a  revelation^  bring 
forward  the  witness.  The  witness !  the  witness !  we  must 
have  the  witness  !"  With  all  my  heart,  dear  Mr,  Observer ; 
only  contain  yourself  a  moment.  You  call  for  a  witness  to  the 
fact  that  God  has  made  us  a  revelation,  and  to  this  fact  you  im- 
ply that  we  have  no  witness  to  produce  but  the  Apostolic  min- 
istry. With  your  leave,  this  is  a  mistake.  There  is  a  wide 
difference  between  what  we  call  the  fact  of  revelation,  and  the 
fact  that  God  has  made  us  a  revelation.  To  the  fact  of  reve- 
lation, that  is,  to  prove  what  is  or  is  not  the  revelation  Almighty 
God  has  made,  the  Apostolic  ministry  is  to  us  the  only  com- 
petent witness  ;  but  to  the  fact  that  Almighty  God  has  made  a 
revelation,  it  is  not,  nor  did  we  pretend  or  imply  that  it  is,  the 
only  witness.     To  this  fact  we  adduce  as  the  witness  historical 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  93 

TESTIMONY,  by  which  we  prove  that  there  was  such  a  person  as 
Jesus  Christ,  and  that  he  wrought  miracles  which  prove  him  to 
have  spoken  by  divine  authority.  Here  is  the  witness  you 
demand.  Do  you  object  to  its  testimony  ?  Bring  forward, 
then,  your  objections,  and  we  will  reply  to  them  when  we  come 
to  defend  the  Church  against  infidels. 

If  the  Observer  had  read  our  article  from  page  45  to  page 
50,  it  would,  perhaps,  have  suspected  that  we  could  extricate 
ourselves  more  easily  from  the  difficulty  it  has  conjured  up, 
than  it  appears  to  have  imagined.  It  is  often  a  convenience 
to  understand  your  opponent,  before  attempting  to  refute  him, 
— though  sometimes  an  inconvenience,  we  admit,  if  one  is 
resolved  beforehand,  come  what  will,  to  have  the  "  pleasure" 
of  refuting  him.  The  Apostolic  ministry,  existing,  as  it  has, 
in  uninterrupted  succession  through  eighteen  hundred  years,  is 
itself,  by  the  very  fact  of  its  existence,  a  proof  of  the  fact  that 
Almighty  God  has  made  us  a  revelation  ;  but  we  did  not  ad- 
duce it,  nor  are  we  obhged,  by  the  logical  conditions  of  our 
argument,  to  adduce  it,  in  proof  of  this  fact ;  for  we  prove  this 
fact  independently  of  its  authority,  by  the  historical  testimony 
by  which  we  establish  the  authenticity  of  the  Scriptures  as 
historical  documents. 

The  Observer  accuses  us  of  reasoning  in  a  vicious  circle, 
because  we  assert  that  the  Apostolic  ministry  is  the  only  com- 
petent witness  to  the  fact  of  revelation,  and  yet  appeal  to  the 
Scriptures  in  proof  of  the  fact  that  a  revelation  has  been  made, 
and  to  determine  the  commission  of  the  ministry.  We  con- 
fess we  can  detect  no  vicious  circle  in  this.  The  fact  that  a 
revelation  has  been  made  was  evidenced  to  those  who  lived  in 
the  age  in  which  it  was  made  by  miracles,  which  accredited 
those  by  whom  it  was  made,  as  we  showed  in  our  article.  We 
appeal  to  the  Scriptures,  in  the  first  instance,  not  to  ascertain 
what  this  revelation  is,  but  as  a  simple  historical  record  of  the 
miracles  and  other  facts,  which  prove  that  a  revelation  has  been 
made,  or  that  God  has  really  spoken  to  man.  It  is  perfectly 
legitimate  to  say,  the  Apostolic  ministry  is  the  only  witness 


94  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

competent  to  say  what  it  is  God  has  or  has  not  spoken,  and 
yet  appeal  to  the  Scriptures  as  historical  doctrines  to  prove 
that  he  has  spoken.     Here  is  no  vicious  circle. 

Nor  do  we  reason  in  a  vicious  circle  when  we  assume  the 
Apostolic  ministry  to  be  the  only  witness  to  the  fact  of  revela- 
tion, and  yet  adduce  the  Scriptures  as  historical  documents  in 
proof  of  the  commission  of  the  ministry.  Because  we  do  not 
first  assume  the  authority  of  the  ministry  as  the  only  proof  of 
the  Scriptures  as  historical  documents,  and  then  adduce  the 
Scriptures  in  proof  of  the  commission  which  authorizes  it  to 
testify  to  that  authenticity.  We  take  the  Scriptures,  already 
proved  to  be  authentic  historical  documents,  so  far  forth  as  his- 
torical in  their  character,  at  least,  so  far  forth  as  Ave  have  occa- 
sion to  use  them  in  the  argument,  to  prove  one  simple  historical 
fact,  namely,  the  commission  which  Jesus  Christ  gave  to  his 
Apostles ;  and  then  we  take  the  ministry,  proved,  through  the 
commission  of  the  Apostles,  to  be  Apostolic,  as  the  witness  to 
the  fact  and  the  expounder  of  revelation,  whether  contained  in 
the  Scriptures  or  deposited  elsewhere.  Here  is  no  vicious  cir- 
cle, and  we  say  so  on  the  authority  of  the  Observer  itself.  We 
accused  the  advocates  of  private  illumination  with  reasoning  in 
a  vicious  circle,  when  they  take  the  witness  to  prove  the  Scrip- 
tures, and  then  the  Scriptures  to  prove  the  witness.  Not  at 
all,  says  the  Observer :  "  For  while  we  take  the  Scriptures  to 
prove  the  witness,  we  do  not  take  the  witness  to  prove  the 
truth  of  the  Scriptures,  but  their  seiise.  The  establishment  of 
the  fact  of  their  existence,  as  the  record  of  God's  revealed  will, 
is  antecedent  to  their  use  to  prove  the  witness,  and  independ- 
ent of  his  testimony,"  This,  though  not  a  complete  reply  to 
us, — because,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  establishment  of  the  exist- 
ence of  the  Scriptures  as  the  record  of  God''s  revealed  will  is 
not  antecedent  to  their  use  to  prove  the  witness,  since  the  fact 
that  they  are  the  record  of  the  revealed  will  of  God  in  its  purity 
and  integrity  is  one  of  the  facts  to  which  the  witness  is  to  testify, 
— is  nevertheless  a  valid  distinction,  and  a  complete  refutation 
of  the  Observer'' s  charge   against  us.     For,  while  w^e  take  tlie 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  95 

Scriptures  as  historical  documents,  to  prove  tlie  conmmission  of 
the  Apostolic  ministry,  we  do  not  take  the  Apostolic  ministry 
to  prove  that  the  Scriptures  are  authentic  historical  documents, 
but  to  prove  what  is  or  is  not  the  word  which  Almighty  God 
lias  spoken.  The  establishment  of  the  fact  of  their  existence 
as  authentic  historical  documents  is  antecedent  to  their  use  to 
prove  the  commission  of  the  Apostolic  ministry,  and  independ- 
ent of  its  testimony.  The  blunder  of  the  Observer  comes  from 
confounding  the  fact  of  the  existence  of  the  Scriptures  as  au- 
thentic historical  documents  with  the  fact  of  their  authority  as  a 
record  of  revelation. 

The  Observer,  however,  is  not  to  be  so  easily  balked  of  the 
"  pleasure "  of  refuting  us. 

"  We  want  no  easier  task  than  to  establish  false  religions  on 
the  principle  here  laid  down.  There  would  be  no  difficulty  to 
get  the  appointment  of  a  body  of  pastors  and  teachers,  and  then 
to  find  witnesses  to  testify  to  the  fact  of  the  aiopointment.  And 
then,  if  this  body  of  teachers  were  allowed  to  say  that  such  and 
such  books  contained  the  record  of  a  revelation  fi-om  God,  we 
could  not  only  have  as  many  false  teachers  as  we  wanted,  but  a 
correspondent  number  of  spurious  Bibles.  If  the  lying  '  witness ' 
swear  to  a  talse  revelation,  the  untrue  revelation  would  of  course 
vouch  for  the  appointment  of  the  witness.  It  is  easy  enough, 
then,  to  bring  historical  testimony  to  the  appointment  of  a  wit- 
ness ;  but  the  authority  of  the  witness — is  it  from  heaven,  or 
of  men  ?  If  you  say,  of  men,  then,  why  believe  the  testimony  ? 
if  from  heaven,  then  it  is  a  revealed  fact,  and  on  your  principles 
cannot  be  known  but  by  the  testimony  of  the  '  witness.'  Bishop 
Sherlock,  in  his  day,  fell  in  with  just  such  reasoners  as  Mr. 
Brownson.  and  pushed  them  around  the  circle  after  this  man- 
ner :  '  The  Scriptures  are  very  intelligent  to  honest  and  diligent 
readers,  in  all  things  necessary  to  salvation  ;  and  if  they  be  not, 
I  desire  to  know  how  we  shall  find  out  the  Church  ;  for  certainly 
the  Church  has  no  charter  but  what  is  in  the  Scriptures ;  and 
then,  if  we  must  believe  the  Church  before  we  can  believe  or 
understand  the  Scriptures,  we  must  believe  the  Church  before 
we  can  possibly  know  whether  there  be  a  church  or  not !  If  we 
prove  the  Church  by  the  Scriptures,  we  must  believe  and  under- 
stand the  Scriptures  before  we  can  know  the  Church.  If  we 
beheve  and  understand  the  Scriptures  upon  the  authority  and 


96  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

interpretation  of  tlie  Church,  considered  as  a  church,  then  we 
must  know  the  Church  before  the  Scriptures.  The  Scripture 
cannot  be  known  without  the  Church,  nor  the  Church  without 
the  Scripture,  and  yet  one  of  them  must  be  known  first ;  yet 
neither  of  them  can  be  known  first,  according  to  these  princi- 
ples ;  which  is  such  an  absurdity,  as  all  the  art  of  the  world  can 
never  palliate.' 

"  That  Mr.  Brownson  may  have  no  ground  to  say  he  is  treat- 
ed unfairly  in  this  matter,  we  give  him  leave  to  hang  upon  just 
which  horn  of  the  dilemma  he  may  choose ;  but  as  for  hanging 
upon  both,  we  insist  that  he  shall  do  no  such  thing." — pp.  138, 
139. 

With  the  Observer's  permission,  we  will,  at  present,  hang  on 
neither  horn.  To  the  extract  from  Bishop  Sherlock  we  reply, 
that  the  Scriptures,  as  authentic  historical  documents,  are  logic- 
ally, though  not  chronologically,  in  our  argumew-t,  before  the 
Church  as  a  divinely  commissioned  body ;  but  the  Church,  as 
the  divinely  commissioned  witness  and  expounder  of  the  word 
of  God,  is  both  logically  and  chronologically  before  the  Scrip- 
tures, for,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  the  Church  is  older  than  the  Scrip- 
tures. 

The  divine  authority  of  the  commission  is  inferred  from  the 
fact  that  it  was  given  by  Jesus  Christ,  proved,  by  the  miracles 
he  performed,  to  speak  by  divine  authority.  The  fact  that  ho 
wrought  miracles,  and  the  fact  that  he  gave  the  commission,  are 
both  historical  facts,  and  provable  by  historical  testimony,  with- 
out our  being  obliged  to  appeal  to  the  authority  of  the  witness. 

But  the  authority  of  the  commission,  if  of  God,  is  a  revealed 
fact.  If  revealed,  it  can  be  proved  only  by  the  authority  of 
the  Apostolic  ministry,  because  that  is  the  only  witness  we  ac- 
knowledge to  the  fact  of  revelation.  Then  we  must  assume  the 
divine  authority  of  the  commission  as  the  condition  of  proving 
it,  which  is  absurd  ;  or  we  must  admit  some  other  witness  than 
the  Apostohc  ministry,  and  then  we  contradict  ourselves,  and 
our  whole  reasoning  falls  to  the  ground.  This  objection  was 
urged  against  us  by  the  Christian  World,  one  of  the  organs 
of  the  Unitarians.  The  reply  is  simple  and  easy.  The  Apos- 
tolic ministry  is  nothing  but  the  continuation  of  Christ's  own 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  97 

ministry  while  lie  was  on  the  earth ;  and  the  Church  teaching, 
which  we  have  called  the  Apostolic  ministry,  was,  while  he 
was  on  earth,  in  him.  But  in  him  its  authority  to  teach  is  not 
established  by  the  commission  to  the  Apostles,  but  by  the 
miracles  he  wrought.  We  take  the  authority  of  the  Church 
teaching  in  him  while  he  was  on  earth,  proved  by  miracles  to 
be  of  God,  to  estabhsh  the  Divine  authority  of  the  commission 
to  the  Apostles.  Consequently,  we  neither  deny  the  Apostolic 
ministry  to  be  the  only  witness,  nor  do  we  fall  into  the  absurdity 
of  assuming  the  divine  authority  of  the  witness  as  the  condition 
of  proving  its  divine  authority.  Will  the  Observer  tell  us  on 
which  horn  of  his  imagined  dilemma  we  now  hang  ? 

The  commission  to  the  Apostles  created  no  new  ministry,  but 
simply  provided  for  the  continuance,  unto  the  consummation  of 
the  world,  of  the  visible  ministry  our  blessed  Sa\iour  had  him- 
self exercised  while  on  the  earth.  "As  my  Father  hath  sent 
me,  so  send  I  you."  AVhen  he  was  on  earth  the  witness  was 
visible  in  him,  now  it  is  visible  in  the  body  of  the  pastors  and 
teachers  of  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  but,  though  visible 
under  other  conditions,  it  is  one  and  the  same ;  "  For,  behold," 
says  our  blessed  Saviour,  "I  am  with  you  all  days  unto  the 
consummation  of  the  w^orld."  He  is  the  vvitness,  and  testifies 
through  them.  Does  the  Observer  ask  a  better  witness  ?  If  it 
does,  it  must  find  him,  for  we  never  pledged  ourselves  to  produce 
a  better. 

One  point  more  we  notice,  and  then  take  our  leave  of  this 
Episcopal  Observer,  till  we  hear  from  him  again.  Our  readers 
will  recollect  the  argument  we  used  to  identify  the  Ecclesia  do- 
cens,  or  Church  teaching,  with  the  Roman  Catholic  ministry. 

"  It  is  the  Roman  Cathohc  ministry.  It  can  be  no  other.  It 
cannot  be  the  Greek  Church.  The  Greek  Church  was  formerly 
in  communion  with  the  Church  of  Rome,  and  made  one  corpo- 
ration with  it.  The  Church  of  Rome  was  then  the  true  church, 
Ecclesia  docens,  or  it  was  not.  If  not,  the  Greek  Church  is 
false,  in  consequence  of  having  communed  with  a  false  church. 
If  it  was,  the  Greek  Church  is  false,  because  it  separated  from 
it.     So  take  either  horn  of  the  dilemma,  the  Greek  Church  is 

5 


98  THE    EPISCOPAL    OBSERVER 

false,  and  its  ministry  not  the  apostolic  ministry  which  inherits 
the  promises.  The  same  reasoning  will  apply  with  equal  force 
to  any  of  the  Oriental  sects  not  in  communion  with  the  see  of 
Rome ;  and,  a  fortiori,  to  all  the  modern  Protestant  sects. 
Therefore,  the  Roman  Catholic  ministry  is  the  Apostolic  corpora- 
tion, because  this  corporation  can  be  no  other." 

Upon  this  the  Episcopal  Observer  remarks  : — 

"  It  is  one  of  the  easiest  things  in  the  world  to  make  out  a 
false  conclusion,  if  one  can  be  allowed  to  slip  a  false  premise  into 
the  process  of  induction.  There  are  so  many  violations  of  the 
rules  of  logic  in  the  abo\e  paragraph,  that  the  reader  would 
hardly  have  patience  to  follow  us  in  their  exposure.  Precisely 
the  same  reasoning,  in  the  same  words,  with  only  a  slight  inter- 
change of  terms,  will  best  show  its  absurdity. 

"'It  is  the  ministry  of  the  Greek  Church.  It  can  be  no 
other.  It  cannot  be  the  Roman  Catholic  ministry.  The  Ro 
man  Catholic  Church  was  formerly  in  communion  with  the 
Greek  Church,  and  made  one  corporation  with  it.  The  Greek 
Church  w\as  then  the  true  church,  Ecclesia  docens,  or  it  was  not. 
If  not,  the  Church  of  Rome  is  false,  in  consequence  of  having 
communed  with  a  false  church.  If  it  was,  the  Church  of  Rome 
is  false,  because  it  scq^arated  from  it.  So,  take  either  horn  of 
the  dilemma,  the  Church  of  Rome  is  false,  and  its  ministry  not 
the  x\postolic  ministry  which  inherits  the  promises,'  &c." — 
p.  141. 

Now,  will  it  be  credited  that  w^e  anticipated  this  retort  and 
replied  to  it  ?     Yet  such  is  the  fact.     Here  is  what  we  said  : — 

"You  object,  in  behalf  of  the  Greek  Church,  that  Rome 
separated  from  her,  not  she  from  Rome.  This  we  deny.  It  is 
historically  certain,  that  the  Greek  Church,  prior  to  the  final 
separation,  agreed  with  the  Church  of  Rome  on  the  matters 
(the  Supremacy  of  the  Pope  and  the  Procession  of  the  Holy 
Ghost)  which  were  made  the  pretexts  for  separation.  In  the 
separation,  the  Greek  Church  denied  what  she  had  before  as- 
serted, while  Rome  continued  to  assert  the  same  doctrine  after 
as  before.  Therefore  the  Greek  Church  was  the  dissentient 
party.  Prior  to  the  separation,  the  Greek  Church  agreed  with 
the  Roman  in  submitting  to  the  papal  authority.  In  the  separ- 
ation, the  Greek  Church  threw  off  this  authority,  while  the 
Roman  continued  to  submit  to  it.  Therefore  the  Greek  Church 
was  the  separatist. 


VERSUS    THE    CHURCH.  99 

"You  insist,  that,  though  the  act  of  separation  may,  indeed, 
have  been  formally  the  act  of  the  Greek  Church,  yet  the  separ- 
ation was  really  on  tlie  part  of  Rome,  who  had  corrupted  the 
faith,  and  rendered  separation  from  her  necessary  to  the  purity 
of  the  Christian  Church.  But,  if  this  be  so,  whatever  the  cor- 
ruptions of  the  faith  Rome  had  been  guilty  of,  the  Greek  Church 
participated  in  them  during  her  communion  with  Rome.  If 
they  vitiated  the  Latin  Church,  they  equally  vitiated  the  Greek. 
Tlien  both  had  failed,  and  the  true  Church,  which  we  have  seen 
is  indefectible,  must  have  been  somewhere  else.  Then  the 
Gi-eek  Church  could  become  a  true  Church  by  separating  from 
the  communion  of  the  Latin  Church  only  on  condition  of  coming 
into  communion  with  the  true  Church.  But  it  came  into  com- 
munion with  no  Church.  Therefore,  the  Greek  Church,  at  any 
rate,  is  false." 

Yet  the  Observer  nowhere  notices  the  fact  that  we  had  thus 
rephed  in  advance,  nor  even  that  we  were  aware  of  the  objec- 
tion. It  has  not  noticed  these  replies,  express  to  its  objection, 
and  yet  it  claims  to  have  refuted  us !  Yes,  it  has  refuted  us, 
by  urging  the  objections  we  ourselves  brought,  but  without  no- 
ticing our  answers !  This  may  be  a  refutation  in  the  Protestant 
sense,  but,  thank  God !  it  is  not  in  the  Catholic  sense.  The  con- 
duct of  the  Observer,  in  this  respect,  we  shall  not  trust  ourselves 
to  characterize  as  it  deserves,  nor  shall  we  suffer  it  to  surprise  us. 
Deprived,  as  the  writer  is,  by  the  simple  fact  that  he  is  a  Protest- 
ant, of  the  ordinary  means  of  divine  grace,  nothing  better  w^as 
to  be  expected  of  him.  He  has  a  cause  to  maintain,  which  does 
not  admit  of  candor  and  truthfulness,  honesty  and  fair  deahng, 
and  we  should  be  more  surprised  to  find  him  exercising  such 
virtues  than  we  are  by  finding  him  sinning  against  them. 

It  is  worthy  of  note  that  this  Episcopal  writer  has  passed  over 
the  articles  in  our  Review  against  his  own  church,  and,  church- 
man as  he  professes  to  be,  has  entered  the  lists  only  against  an 
article  the  -  main  design  of  which  was  to  defend  the  Chui-ch 
against  No-Church.  It  is  also  worthy  of  note,  that  the  objec- 
tions he  has  brought  against  us  were  nearly  all  brought  pre- 
viously in  the  Christian  Register  and  Christian  World,  the  two 
weekly  organs  of  the  No-Church  Unitarians.      What  does  this 


100  thornwell's  answer 

indicate  ?  Are  Unitarians  and  Episcopalians  acting  in  concert  ? 
or  are  we  to  infer  that  a  common  dread  of  Catholicity  is  com- 
bining all  the  various  Protestant  sects  against  the  Catholic 
Church  ?  This  last  seems  to  us  not  improbable.  The  signs  of 
the  times  seem  to  indicate  that  the  several  tribes  of  Goths,  Van- 
dals, Huns,  and  other  barbarians,  are  forming  a  league  for  a  new 
invasion  of  Rome.  Well,  be  it  so.  "He  that  dwelleth  in 
heaven  shall  laugh  at  them,  and  the  Lord  shall  deride  them." 
The  Episcopalians  may  read  their  destiny  in  that  of  the  old 
Donatists,  whom,  in  many  respects,  they  resemble ;  and  all  the 
Protestant  sects  combined  are  not  so  formidable  to  the  Church 
as  were,  at  one  period,  the  old  Arians.  The  Church  triumphed 
over  the  Arians ;  she  will  triumph  over  the  Protestants.  A 
union  whose  princij^le  is  hatred  will  not  long  subsist,  but  will 
soon  break  asunder.  Protestantism  is  doomed.  The  Devil  may 
be  very  active  and  full  of  wrath,  and  utter  great  swelling  words, 
for  a  season,  because  he  knows  that  his  time  is  short ;  but  Prot- 
estantism must  go  the  way  of  all  the  earth.  The  Lord  will 
remember  mercy,  and  will  not  much  longer  afflict  the  nations, 
but  will  recall  them  to  the  bosom  of  his  Church. 


THORNWELL'S   ANSWER  TO   DR.   LYNCH.* 

APRIL,    1848. 

Sometime  in  1841,  Mr.  Thorn  well,  a  Presbyterian  minister, 
and  "  Professor  of  Sacred  Literature  and  the  Evidences  of  Chris- 
tianity in  the  South-Carolina  College,"  published,  anonymously, 
in  a  Baltimore  journal,  a  brief  essay  against  the  divine  inspira- 

*  The  Apocryphal  Books  of  the  Old  Testament  proved  to  be  Corrupt 
Additions  to  the  Word  of  God. — The  Arguments  of  Romanists  from 
the  Infallibility  of  the  Church  and  the  Testimonies  of  the  Fathers  in 
Behalf  of  the  Apocrypha  discussed  and  refuted.  By  James  H. 
Thornwell.  New  York  :  Leavitt,  Trow,  &  Co.  Boston :  Charles 
Tappan.     1845.     16mo.     pp.  417. 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  101 

tion  of  those  books  of  the  Old  Testament  which  Protestants 
exclude  from  the  canon  of  Scripture.  To  this  essay,  as  subse- 
quently reprinted  with  the  author's  name,  the  Rev.  Dr.  Lynch, 
of  Charleston,  S.  C,  rephed,  in  a  series  of  letters  addressed  to 
Mr.  Thornwell,  through  the  columns  of  The  Catholic  Miscel- 
lany. The  volume  before  us  is  Mr.  Thornwell's  rejoinder  to  Dr. 
Lynch,  and  contains,  in  an  Appendix,  the  original  essay,  and  the 
substance  of  Dr.  Lynch's  reply  to  it.  The  rejoinder  consists  of 
twentyrnine  letters,  which  cover  nearly  the  whole  ground  of 
controversy  between  Catholics  and  Protestants,  and,  though 
written  in  a  Presbyterian  spirit,  they  are  respectable  for  ability 
and  learning.  The  work,  though  nothing  surprising,  is,  upon 
the  whole,  above  the  general  average  of  publications  of  its  class. 

The  purpose  of  the  essay  was  to  "assert  and  endeavor  to 
prove  that  Tohit,  Judith,  the  additions  to  the  Book  of  Esther, 
Wisdom,  Ecclesiasticus,  Baruch,  ivith  the  Epistle  of  Jeremiah, 
the  Song  of  the  Three  Children,  the  Story  of  Susannah,  the 
Story  of  Bel  and  the  Dragon,  and  the  First  and  Second  Books 
of  Maccabees  are  neither  sacred  nor  canonical,  and  of  course  of 
no  more  authority  in  the  Church  of  God  than  Seneca's  Letters 
or  Tully's  Offices."  (pp.  339,  340.)  Li  the  present  work,  the 
author  attempts  to  maintain  the  same  thesis,  and  to  refute  the 
objections  urged  by  Dr.  Lynch  against  it.  He  professes  on  his 
very  title-page  to  have  2^'oved  the  books  enumerated  "  to  be 
corrupt  additions  to  the  word  of  God,"  and  to  have  discussed 
and  refuted  ''  the  arguments  of  Romanists  from  the  infallibility 
of  the  Church  and  the  testimonies  of  the  Fathers  in  their 
behalf."  The  question  very  naturally  arises.  Has  he  done  this  ? 
Has  he  proved  that  these  books  are  uninspired,  as  he  must  have 
done,  if  he  has  proved  them  to  be  corrupt  additions  to  the  word 
of  God;  and  has  he  refuted  the  arguments  of  Catholics,  or 
rather  of  Dr.  Lynch,  in  their  behalf  ? 

The  arguments  which  Dr.  Lynch  adduces  for  these  books  are 
drawn  from  the  infollibility  of  the  Church  and  the  testimony  of 
the  Fathers.  If  the  Church  is  infallible,  the  testimony  of  the 
Fathers  is  of  subordinate  importance,  for  the  infallibility  alone 


102  THORNWELLS    ANSWER 

suffices  for  the  faithful ;  if  the  Church  is  not  infalHble,  it  is  of 
still  less  consequence  what  the  Fathers  testify ;  for  then  all  faith 
is  out  of  the  question,  both  for  Catholics  and  all  others.  We 
may,  therefore,  waive  all  consideration,  for  the  present,  of  the 
argument  for  the  deutero-canonical  books  drawn  from  the  testi- 
mony of  the  Fathers,  and  confine  ourselves  to  that  drawn  from 
the  infallibility  of  the  Church.  The  argument  from  infallibility 
must,  of  course,  be  refuted,  before  the  author  can  claim  to  ha\'e 
,refuted  Dr.  Lynch,  or  to  have  proved  his  general  thesis,  that 
the  books  in  question  are  "  corrupt  additions  to  the  word  of 
God." 

The  Catholic  Church,  undeniably,  includes  these  books  in 
her  canon  of  Scripture,  and  commands  her  children  to  receive 
them  as  the  word  of  God.  This  is  cei'tain,  and  the  author 
concedes  it ;  for  he  adduces  it  as  a  proof  of  her  "  intolerable 
arrogance."  If  she  is  infallible  in  declaring  the  word  of  God, 
as  all  Catholics  hold,  these  books  are  certainly  inspired  Scrip- 
ture, and  rightfully  placed  in  the  canon.  This  is  the  argument 
from  infallibility ;  and  it  is  evident  to  every  one  who  under- 
stands what  it  is  to  refute  an  argument  that  it  can  be  refuted 
only  by  disproving  the  infallibility,  or,  what  is  the  same  thing, 
proving  the  fallibility,  of  the  Church.  To  prove  the  Church 
fallible,  moreover,  it  is  not  enough  to  refute  the  arguments  by 
which  Cathohcs  are  accustomed  to  prove  her  infallibility ;  for 
a  doctrine  may  be  true,  and  yet  the  arguments  adduced  in 
proof  of  it  be  unsound  and  inconclusive.  It  will,  therefore, 
avail  the  author  but  little  to  refute  our  arguments  for  the  in- 
frdhbility,  unless  he  refutes  the  infallibility  itself;  for  so  long- 
as  he  is  unable  to  say  positively  that  the  Church  is  fallible,  he 
is  unable  to  refute  the  argument  from  her  infallibility.  It  may 
still  be  true  that  she  is  iuMlible,  and  if  she  is,  the  books  are 
not  uninspired  compositions,  but  infellibly  the  word  of  God. 

Mr.  Thorn  well,  who  regards  himself  as  an  able  and  sound 
logician,  appears  to  have  some  consciou^^ness  of  this,  and  in- 
deed to  concede  it.  ^Accordingly,  he  devotes  a  third  of  his 
whole  volume  to  disproving  the  infallibility  of  the  Church,  or 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  103 

7atlier,  to  pro^^ng  her  fallibility.  "I  have  insisted,"  he  says 
in  his  Preface,  "largely  on  the  dogma  of  infallibility, — more 
largely,  perhaps,  than  my  readers  may  think  consistent  with  the 
general  design  of  my  performance, — ^because  I  regard  this  as 
the  prop  and  bulwark  of  all  the  abominations  of  the  Papacy." 
(p.  s.) 

But  to  prove  the  falhbility  of  the  Church,  or  to  disprove  her 
infallibihty,  is  a  grave  undertaking,  and  attended  with  serious 
difficulties.  The  Church  cannot  be  tried  except  by  some  stand- 
ard, and  it  is  idle  to  attempt  to  convict  her  on  a  fiiUible  au- 
thority. If  the  conviction  is  obtained  on  a  fallible  authority, 
the  conviction  itself  is  fallible,  and  it,  instead  of  the  Church, 
may  be  the  party  in  the  wrong.  The  Professor  cannot  take  a 
single  step,  cannot  even  open  his  case,  unless  he  has  an  infalli- 
ble tribunal  before  which  to  summon  the  Church, — some  infal- 
lible standard  by  which  to  test  her  infallibihty  or  fallibility.  But 
before  what  infallible  tribunal  can  he  cite  her  ?  What  infalhble 
authority  has  he  on  which  he  can  demand  her  conviction  ? 

The  only  possible  way  in  which  the  fallibility  of  the  Church 
can  be  proved  is  by  convicting  her  of  having  actually  erred  on 
some  point  on  which  she  claims  to  be  infallible.  But  it  is  evi- 
dent, that,  in  order  to  be  able  to  convict  her  of  having  erred  on 
a  given  point,  we  must  be  able  to  say  infallibly  what  is  truth  or 
error  on  that  point.  Clearly,  then,  the  Professor  cannot  com- 
mence his  action,  much  less  gain  it,  unless  he  has  an  authority 
which  pronounces  infallibly  on  the  points  on  which  he  seeks  to 
convict  her  of  having  actually  erred.  But  what  authority  has 
he  ?  Unhappily,  he  does  not  inform  us,  and  does  not  appear  to 
have  recognized  the  necessity  on  his  part  of  having  any  author- 
ity. He  sets  forth,  formally,  no  authority,  designates  no  court, 
specifies  no  law,  lays  down  no  principles.  This  is  a  serious 
inconvenience,  and  affects  both  his  legal  and  his  logical  attain- 
ments. His  argument,  let  him  do  his  best,  must  be  minus  its 
major  proposition ;  and  from  the  minor  alone  we  have  always 
understood  that  it  is  impossible  to  conclude  any  thing. 

Mr.  Thornw^U  denies  the  infallibility  of  the  Church,  and  he 


104 

recognizes  no  infallible  authority  in  any  one  of  the  sects,  includ- 
ing even  his  own.  He  has,  then  no  authority  which  he  can  al- 
lege, but  the  authority  of  reason,  and  his  own  private  judgment. 
Ilis  own  private  judgment  is  of  no  weight,  and  cannot  be  ad- 
duced in  a  public  discussion.  The  authority  of  reason  we  ac- 
knowledge to  be  infallible  in  her  own  province ;  but  her  pro- 
vince is  restricted  to  the  natural  order,  and  she  has  no  jurisdic- 
tion in  the  supernatural  order,  to  which  the  Church  professes  to 
belong.  The  Church  has  the  right  to  be  tried  by  her  peers. 
Reason  is  not,  and  cannot  be,  the  peer  of  the  supernatural,  and 
is  totally  unable,  in  so  far  as  the  Church  lies  within  the  super- 
natural order,  to  pronounce  any  judgment  concerning  lier  infalli- 
bility one  way  or  the  other. 

Reason,  undoubtedly,  knows  that  God  is,  and  that  he  can 
neither  deceive  nor  be  deceived.  It  knows,  therefore,  if  he  ap- 
points the  Church,  commissions  her,  as  his  organ,  to  declare  his 
word,  that  she  must  declare  it  infellibly ;  for  then  it  is  he  him- 
self that  declares  in  her  declaration,  and  if  she  could  either  de- 
ceive or  be  deceived,  he  himself  could  either  deceive  or  be  de- 
ceived. If,  then,  reason  finds  sufficient  or  satisfactory  grounds 
for  believing  that  God  has  appointed  or  instituted  the  Church  to 
declare  his  word,  to  teach  all  nations  to  observe  all  things  what- 
soever he  has  revealed,  it  pronounces  her  infallible,  and  acknowl- 
edges its  obligation  to  receive,  without  any  questioning,  what- 
ever she  teaches. 

Reason,  again,  knows  that  God  cannot  be  in  contradiction 
with  himself,  and  therefore,  since  both  the  natural  order  and  the 
supernatural  are  from  him,  that  he  cannot  establish  principles  in 
the  one  repugnant  to  those  established  in  the  other.  On  tlie 
authority  of  reason,  then,  we  may  always  assert  that  he  cannot 
teach  one  thing  in  the  natural  order  and  its  contradictory  in  the 
supernatural  order.  If,  then,  it  be  clearly  established,  that  the 
Church,  on  matters  on  which  she  claims  to  teach  infallibly, 
teaches  what  is  in  contradiction  either  to  the  supernatural  or  the 
natural  order,  it  is  certain  that  she  is  falhble.  But  as  reason 
cannot  go  out  of  the  order  of  nature,  we  can  on  its  authority 


TO    DK.    LYNCH.  105 

establish  the  follibility  of  tlie  Church  only  on  the  condition  of 
convicting  her  of  having  actually  contradicted  some  law  or  prin- 
ciple of  the  natural  order.  If  the  Church,  in  other  words,  con- 
tradict reason,  reason  is  competent  to  conclude  against  her,  but 
not  when  she  merely  transcends  reason ;  for  what  is  above  rea- 
son may  be  true,  but  what  is  against  reason  cannot  be. 

It  follows  from  this  that  the  authority  of  reason  in  the  case 
before  us  is  purely  negative,  and  that  the  Pi'ofessor  can  conclude 
fi'om  it  against  the  Church  only  on  condition  that  he  proves 
that  she  actually  contradicts  it.  But  it  is  necessary  even  here 
to  bear  in  mind  that  the  natural  can  no  more  contradict  the 
supernatural  than  the  supernatural  the  natural.  ^Mien  the 
motives  of  credibility  have  convinced  reason  that  the  Church 
teaches  by  supernatural  authority,  her  teaching  is  as  authorita- 
tive as  any  principle  of  reason  itself,  and  may  be  cited  to  prove 
that  what  is  alleged  against  her  as  a  principle  of  reason  is  not  a 
principle  of  reason,  with  no  less  force  than  the  alleged  principle 
itself  can  be  cited  to  prove  that  she  contradicts  reason.  The 
Professor  must,  then,  in  order  to  prove  her  fallibihty,  adduce  a 
case,  not  of  apparent  contradiction,  but  of  real  contradiction, — 
a  case  in  which  what  she  teaches  must  evidently  contradict  an 
evident  principle  of  reason, — so  evident  that  it  is  clear  that  to 
deny  it  would  be  to  deny  reason  itself 

The  position,  then,  which  the  Professor  must  take  and  main- 
tain, in  order  to  establish  his  thesis,  is,  that  the  Church,  in  her 
teaching  on  matters  on  ivhich  she  claims  to  teach  infallibly,  has 
taught  or  teaches  what  contradicts  an  evident  and  undeniable 
principle  of  reason.  This  he  must  do  before  he  can  prove  the 
fallibility  of  the  Church,  and  he  must  prove  the  fallibihty  of  the 
Church  before  he  can  refute  the  argument  drawn  from  it  for  the 
books  enumerated.  Has  he  proved  this  ?  Unhappily,  he  does 
not  appear  to  have  understood  that  this  was  at  all  necessary,  or 
to  have  suspected  that  it  was  only  by  proving  the  Church  to  be 
against  reason  that  he  could  conclude  her  fallibility.  He  does 
not  appear  to  have  known  that  there  are  and  can  be  no  ques- 
tions debatable  between  Catholics  and  Protestants  but  such  as 


106 

pertain  exclusively  to  the  province  of  reason.  He  labors  under 
the  hallucination,  that  he  has  something  besides  the  reason  com- 
mon to  all  men  which  he  may  oppose  to  us,  that  he  has  the  re- 
velation of  Almighty  God,  and  that  he  is  at  hberty  to  attempt 
to  convict  the  Church,  not  on  reason  alone,  but  also  on  the  word 
of  God.  This  would  be  ridiculous,  if  the  matter  were  not  so 
grave  as  to  make  it  deplorable.  He  has  no  word  of  God  to 
cite  against  us,  and  if  he  cites  the  Holy  Scriptures  at  all,  he 
must  cite  them  either  in  the  sense  of  the  Church,  or  as  simple 
historical  documents ;  because  it  is  only  in  the  sense  of  the 
Church  that  we  acknowledge  them  to  be  inspired.  We  can 
cite  them  as  inspired  Scripture  against  him,  as  an  argumentum 
ad  hominem  ;  for  he  holds  them  to  be  inspired  Scripture  as  in- 
terpreted by  private  judgment.  But  he  cannot  against  us  ;  for 
the  ar£(ument  would  not  be  ad  hominem^  unless  cited  in  the 
sense  of  the  Church,  since  it  is  only  in  that  sense,  that,  on  our 
own  pi-inciples,  they  are  the  word  of  God. 

The  fact  is,  Mr.  Thornwell  from  first  to  last  forgets  in  his 
argument  that  we  are  as  far  from  admitting  his  authority  as  he 
is  fi'om  admitting  ours.  He  writes  under  the  impression,  that 
he  has  the  true  Christian  doctrine,  and  is  invested  with  am[>le 
authority  to  define  what  is,  and  what  is  not,  the  word  of  God. 
He  assumes  his  Presbyterianism  to  be  true,  and  when  he  has 
J. roved  that  Catholicity  contradicts  it,  he  concludes  at  once  that 
Catholicity  is  false.  But  Presbyteiianism  is  only  his  private 
judgment,  and  therefore  of  no  authority.  By  what  right  does 
he  erect  his  private  judgment  into  a  criterion  of  truth  and 
falsehood,  assume  that  it  is  infallible,  and  proceed  to  pronounce 
ex  cathedra  on  the  revealed  word  of  God  ?  We  cannot  recog- 
nize his  authority  as  sovereign  pontiff,  unless  he  brings  us 
credentials  from  heaven,  duly  signed  and  witnessed.  His  as- 
sumption we  cannot  admit.  He  is  confessedly  fallible,  and  his 
decisions  we  cannot  even  entertain.  He  does  not  come  to  us 
duly  commissioned  by  Almighty  God  to  teach  us  his  word ;  he 
is  simply  a  man,  with  no  authority  in  the  premises  which  may 
not  be  claimed  and  exercised  by  every  other  man  as  well  as  by 


TO    DR.    LYNCH. 


107 


himself.  In  an  argument  witli  Catholics  lie  can  be  only  a  man, 
and  is  at  liberty  to  adopt  no  line  of  argument  that  would  not 
be  equally  proper  in  the  case  of  a  pagan,  Mahometan,  or  any 
other  infidel. 

Protestant  controversialists  are  exceedingly  prone  to  forget 
this.  They  assume  that  they  have  the  word  of  God,  that  they 
know  and  believe  what  God  has  revealed,  and  that  they  have  in 
their  opinions  a  standard  by  which  to  try  the  Chm-ch.  Yet  they 
claim  to  be  reasoners,  and  tell  us  that  we  have  surrendered  our 
reason !  But  whether  the  Church  be  or  be  not  commissioned 
to  declare  the  word  of  God,  it  is  certain  that  they  are  not. 
Certain  is  it,  that,  if  she  is  not  authorized  to  declare  it,  no  one 
else  is  ;  and  equally  certain  is  it,  that  no  one  not  so  authorized 
has  any  right  to  adduce  m  an  argument  any  thing  he  takes  to 
be  the  word  of  God,  save  by  the  sufferance  or  consent  of  his 
opponents.  It  is  a  gTave  mistake  to  suppose  that  there  is  any 
other  common  ground  between  us  and  our  adversaries  than  that 
of  reason.  It  will  not  do  for  our  advei-saries  to  suppose,  that, 
because  we  hold  to  the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptm-es,  they  may 
allege  them  in  their  own  sense  against  us  ;  for  we  admit  their 
inspiration  only  on  the  authority,  and  in  the  sense,  of  the  Church. 
On  her  authority,  and  in  the  sense  in  which  she  defines  then- 
doctrines,  we  hold  them  to  be  the  word  of  God ;  but  m  no 
other  sense,  and  on  no  other  ground.  Independently  of  her 
authority  and  mterpretations,  there  are  no  mspired  Scriptures 
for  us.  This  fact  must  never  be  lost  sight  of,  and  it  would  save 
Protestants  an  immense  deal  of  labor,  if  they  would  keep  it  m 
mind,  and  govern  themselves  accorduigly.  If  they  cite  the 
Bible  agamst  us,  on  any  authority  or  in  any  sense  but  that  of 
the  Church,  it  is  not  for  us  the  word  of  God,  but  simply  then- 
private  opinion,  by  which  we  are  not  and  cannot  be  bound. 
Among  ourselves,  who  admit  the  authority  of  the  Church,  and 
therefore  the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures,  it  is  lawful,  on  a  point 
on  which  the  actual  teaching  of  the  Church  is  matter  of  inquiry, 
to  appeal  to  the  written  word,  as  also  to  the  Fathers  and  Doctors 
of  the  Church,  and  also  to  the  analogies  of  faith  >  but  it  is  never 


108  THORN  WELLS    ANSWER 

lawful  for  those  out  of  tlie  Church,  denying  her  authority,  to 
make  a  like  appeal  against  us  ;  for  the  authority  to  which  we 
appeal  is  resolvable  into  the  authority  of  the  Church,  which 
they  deny. 

The  rule  we  here  insist  upon  is  that  of  common  sense  and 
common  justice,  and  rests  for  its  authority  on  the  principle, 
that  no  man  has  the  right  to  assume  in  his  argument  the  point 
that  is  in  question.  We  ourselves  cite  the  Scriptures  against 
our  adversaries,  but  always  either  ad  hominem, — because  they, 
though  we  do  not,  admit  their  inspiration  independently  of  the 
authority  of  the  Church, — or  as  simple  historical  documents, 
whose  authenticity  and  authority  as  such  documents,  but  not  as 
inspired  writings,  reason  is  competent  to  determine.  But  we 
never  assume  our  Church  and  her  definitions  as  the  authority 
on  which  to  convict  those  without  of  error  ;  for  to  do  so  would 
be  a  sheer  begging  of  the  question.  Undoubtedly,  if  our  Church 
is  right,  all  her  adversaries  are  wrong.  It  needs  no  argmnent 
to  prove  that.  We,  therefore,  take  our  stand  in  the  argument, 
either  on  what  our  advei-saries  concede,  or  on  the  common  rea- 
son of  mankind,  and  attempt  to  prove  from  the  one  or  the 
other,  or  both,  that  every  one  is  bound  to  believe  and  obey  the 
Church.  Protestants  must  not  expect  us  to  allow  them  more 
than  we  claim  for  ourselves.  They  may  need  more  in  order  to 
make  out  their  case  ;  but  we  are  not  aware  that  they  have  any 
right  to  special  privileges,  or  to  exemption  from  the  common 
obligations  of  reason  and  justice.  As  there  are  no  concessions 
of  ours  which  can  avail  them,  they  must  in  their  controversies 
with  us  take  their  stand  on  the  reason  common  to  all  men,  and, 
since  common  to  all,  alike  theirs  and  ours.  They  must  bring 
their  action  at  common  law,  not  on  a  special  statute.  Then  they 
must  restrict  themselves  to  those  questions  which  come  within 
the  jurisdiction  of  reason,  and  which  she  is  competent  to  decide 
without  appeal.  Then  they  must  waive  all  questions  which 
pei'tain  to  the  subject-matter  of  revelation ;  for  these  all  unde- 
niably lie  in  the  supernatural  order,  and  therefore  without  tlie 
province  of  reason. 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  109 

We  frankly  concede  that  Mr.  Thornwell  has  proved  that 
Catholicity  is  not  Presbyterianism,  and  that,  if  Presbyterianism 
is  the  revelation  of  God,  Catholicity  is  not.  But  this  amounts 
to  nothing ;  Presbyterianism  is  neither  proved  nor  conceded  to 
be  Christianity.  He  cannot,  therefore,  assume  it  agamst  us. 
We  concede  him  not  one  inch  of  Christian  ground  on  which  to 
set  his  foot.  We  demur  to  every  argument  he  adduces  or  at- 
tempts to  adduce  from  the  convictions  or  prejudices  of  his  sect, 
or  from  his  own  conceptions  of  the  word  of  God.  We  listen  to 
no  arguments,  we  entertain  no  objections,  we  plead  to  no  char- 
ges, not  di*awn  from  the  common  reason  of  mankind.  We  must, 
therefore,  beg  him  to  descend  from  his  tripod,  and  meet  us  as 
a  man  with  no  authority  but  that  which  belongs  to  the  reason 
of  every  man. 

We  must,  in  view  of  this  state  of  the  case,  eliminate  from 
Mr.  Thornwell's  arguments  against  infallibihty,  as  not  to  be  en- 
tertained, all  that  he  urges  on  the  authority  of  his  own  religious 
convictions  or  prejudices,  and  confine  ourselves  simply  to  what 
he  adduces  on  the  simple  authority  of  reason.  These  last,  all 
that  is  legitimately  adduced,  consist  of  an  attempted  refutation 
of  Dr.  Lynch's  argument  for  the  infallibility  of  the  Church,  and 
certain  philosophical,  historical,  and  moral  objections  alleged 
agamst  the  Church. 

We  might  well  pass  over  Mr.  Thornwell's  attempt  to  refute 
Dr.  Lynch's  argument  for  infallibihty,  because,  if  successful,  it 
would  accomplish  nothing  to  his  purpose.  The  argument  he  has 
to  refute  is  the  argument  from  the  infallibility  of  the  Church, 
not  the  argument  for  it ;  for  the  question  is  not  on  believing 
that  infalhbility,  but  on  denying  it.  It  may,  as  we  have  said, 
be  true,  and  yet  the  arguments  by  w^hich  we  attempt  to  prove 
it  be  unsound  and  inconclusive.  The  defect  of  proof  is  a  good 
reason  for  not  believing,  but  it  is  not  always  an  adequate  reason 
for  denying.  The  thesis  the  Professor  seeks  to  maintain  requires 
him  to  deny  the  infallibility  of  the  Church,  or  to  assert  her  falli- 
bility, and  therefore  the  burden  of  proof  devolves  on  Mm.  He 
asserts  that  the  disputed  books  are  corrupt  additions  to  the  word 


110  thornwell's  answer 

of  God,  which  he  cannot  possibly  prove  without  disproving  the 
infallibihty  of  the  Church,  which  declares  them  to  be  inspired 
Scripture.  But  he  claims  to  have  won  a  victory  over  Dr. 
Lynch,  and  his  friends  have  bomid  the  laurel  around  his  brows. 
We  are,  therefore,  disposed  to  subject  his  claim  to  a  slight  exam- 
ination, and  to  inquire  if  his  shouts  have  not  been  a  little  pre- 
mature, and  if,  after  all,  the  victory  does  not  remain  with  his 
opponent.  If  he  has  succeeded,  he  has  gained  nothing  for  his 
thesis  ;  but  if  he  has  failed,  we  can  conclude  against  it  at  once, 
at  least  so  far  as  he  is  concerned. 

Mr.  Thornwell  states  Dr.  Lynch's  general  argument  for  the 
disputed  books  to  be, — 

"  Whatever  the  pastors  of  the  Church  of  Rome  declare  to  be 
true  must  be  infallibly  certain  : 

"  That  the  Apocrypha  [the  books  enumerated]  were  inspired, 
the  pastors  of  the  Church  of  Rome  declare  to  be  true  : 

"  Therefore  it  must  be  infallibly  certain." 

This  is  stated  in  Mr.  Thornwell's  language,  not  in  Dr.  Lynch's, 
and  is  by  no  means  so  well  expressed  as  it  might  be ;  but  let 
that  pass.  Substituting  the  names  of  the  books  alleged  by  Mr. 
Thornwell  to  be  corrupt  additions  to  the  word  of  God  for  the 
term  Apocrypha,  we  are  willing  to  accept  it.  To  this  argument, 
which  he  has  shaped  to  suit  the  objections  he  wishes  to  bring 
against  it,  Mr.  Thornwell's  first  objection  is,  that  it  is  "  vitiated 
by  the  ambiguity  of  the  middle."  The  words  "  pastors  of  the 
Church,"  may  be  understood  either  universally,  particularly,  or 
distributively, — to  mean  the  whole  body  of  the  pastors,  some  of 
them,  and  every  one  individually. 

Ambiguity  of  the  middle  is  where  the  words  are  taken  in  one 
sense  in  the  major,  and  in  another  sense  in  the  minor;  but 
where  they  are  taken  in  the  same  sense  in  both  the  premises, 
although  in  themselves  susceptible  of  several  meanings,  there  is 
no  ambiguity  of  the  middle.  In  the  argument  as  stated,  the 
words,  ^a5/or5,  &c.,  are,  in  themselves  considered,  susceptible  of 
the  senses  alleged,  but  as  used  in  the  argument  they  are  tied 
down  to  one  sense.     The  rule  of  construction  is,  to  understand 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  Ill 

all  words  used  in  a  general  or  universal  sense,  unless  there  be 
some  reason,  expressed  or  implied,  in  the  context  or  the  nature 
of  the  subject,  for  not  doing  so.  There  is,  in  the  present  case, 
no  such  reason  in  either  premise,  and  therefore  we  must  take 
the  words  generally,  or  universally,  in  both, — for  the  whole  body 
of  pastors.     If  so,  there  is  no  ambiguity  of  the  middle. 

But  Mr.  Thorn  well  asserts  that  Dr.  Lynch  does  use  the  words 
in  the  three  different  senses  mentioned.  He  accuses  him  of 
meaning  by  them,  at  one  time,  the  whole  body  of  pastors  col- 
lected or  assembled  in  council,  at  another  time,  a  part  only,  and 
finally,  every  one  individually ;  and  alleges  as  proof,  the  fact, 
that  in  his  Letter  he  predicates  infalhbihty,  1.  of  the  whole  body 
of  pastors  in  their  collective  capacity,  2.  of  the  Council  of 
Trent,  in  which  only  a  part  were  personally  assembled,  and  3.  of 
each  single  teacher  or  missionary. 

1.  That  Dr.  Lynch,  when  he  predicates  infallibility  of  the 
body  of  pastors  in  their  collective  capacity,  means  the  whole 
body,  takes  the  words,  j^ctstors,  &c.,  universally,  is  conceded,  but 
that  he  means  the  whole  body  assernhled  in  council  we  denv. 
He  speaks  of  them  as  a  body  of  individuals  in  their  collective 
capacity,  not  as  a  collected  or  congregated  body ;  and  that  he 
does  not  mean  the  body  of  pastors  assembled  in  council  is  evi- 
dent from  the  fact,  that  he  contends  that  the  pastors  of  the 
Church  had  decided  the  question  of  the  inspiration  of  the  books 
in  dispute  long  before  the  Council  of  Trent,  since,  to  do  so,  they 
did  not  need  to  assemble  in  a  general  council.  Thus  he  savs 
expressly, — "The  doctrines  of  the  Catholic  Church  can  be 
known  from  the  universal  and  concordant  teaching  of  her  pas- 
tors, even  when  her  bishops  have  not  assembled  in  a  general 
council  and  embodied  those  doctrines  in  a  list  of  decrees."  (pp. 
370,  3*71.)  It  is  evident,  then,  that  Dr.  Lynch  holds  the  pas- 
tors of  the  Church  to  be  a  body  of  individuals,  to  have  a  collec- 
tive capacity,  and  the  faculty  of  teaching  infallibly  in  that  capa- 
city, even  when  not  congregated.  If  Mr.  Thornwell  had  recog- 
nized a  diflference  between  collective  *Sindi  collected^  or  congregated, 


112  thornavell's  answer 

he  would  easily  have  surmounted  this  part  of  his  difficulty,  with- 
out any  foreign  aid. 

2.  The  acts  of  the  Holy  Council  of  Trent,  touching  faith  and 
morals,  Dr.  Lynch  unquestionably  holds  to  be  infallible,  not  be- 
cause he  predicates  infallibility  of  a  part  of  the  body  of  pastors, 
but  because  they  were  the  acts  of  the  whole  Church  represented 
in  it,  or  at  least  made  so  by  subsequent  adoption,  as  is  evident 
enough  from  his  language.  The  proof,  therefore,  that  he  take? 
the  words  in  a  partitive  sense,  is  inadequate. 

3.  That  each  single  pastor  teaches  infallibly  in  his  collectivi 
capacity^  as  "  member  "  of  the  body  of  pastors,  is  conceded,  but 
that  he  does  so  individually  or  in  his  individual  capacity  is  de- 
nied ;  for  in  his  individual  capacity  he  cannot  teach  at  all.  Dr. 
Lynch  speaks  of  his  teaching  infallibly  only  in  his  capacity  as 
member  of  the  body.  As  member  of  the  body,  the  only  sense 
in  which  he  is  a  teacher  at  all,  he  participates  of  its  infallibility^ 
and  teaches  by  its  authority,  and  infallibly,  not  because  he  is  in- 
dividually infallible,  but  because  it  is  infallible.  Consequentl}; 
in  representing  the  single  teacher  as  teaching  infalhbly.  Dr. 
Lynch  does  not  use  the  words  ^x^stors,  (fee,  in  a  distributive 
sense. 

Mr.  Thornwell  is  unfortunate  in  his  proofs,  notwithstanding  he 
had  shaped  his  statement  of  the  argument  with  special  reference 
to  them.  He  fails  to  substantiate  his  objection  of  "  ambiguity 
of  the  middle,"  and  consequently  all  that  he  says,  which  is 
founded  on  it,  falls  to  the  ground.  The  beautiful  argument  he 
had  constructed  to  prove  that  a  Cathohc  can  never  know  Avhen 
and  where  to  find  the  infallible  authority  on  which  he  had  ex- 
pended so  much  labor,  and  lavished  so  many  rare  ornaments, 
falls  to  pieces  through  default  of  a  foundation.  Decidedly,  it  is 
an  inconvenience  to  build  without  any  thing  to  build  with  or  to 
build  on.  It  is  worse  than  being  compelled  to  make  bricks  with- 
out straw. 

Mr.  Thornwell,  after  his  objection  to  the  form  of  the  argument, 
proceeds  to  deny  and  to  refute  its  major,  namely,  the  infallibility 
of  the  Church.     His  first  effort  is  to  refute  Dr.  Lynch's  argu- 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  113 

ment  for  it.  Dr.  Lynch  contends  tliat  "  we  cannot  be  called  on 
to  believe  any  proposition  without  adequate  proof;"  that  "when 
Almighty  God  designed  to  inspire  the  works  contained  in  the 
Holy  Scriptures,  he  intended  they  should  be  believed  to  be  in- 
spired ;"  and  that  "  therefore  there  does  exist  some  adequate 
proof"  Thus  for  all  is  evident  enough,  and  the  Professor  brings 
no  objection  to  what  is  alleged.  We  may  presume  it,  then,  as 
conceded,  that  there  does  exist  some  adequate  proof  of  their 
inspiration,  that  is  to  say,  some  authority  competent  to  declare 
the  fact.  What  is  it  ?  "  It  must  be,"  says  Dr.  Lynch,  "  a  body 
of  individuals  to  whom,  in  their  collective  capacity,  God  has 
given  authority  to  make  an  unerring  decision  on  the  subject." 
It  must  be  such  a  body,  because  it  can  be  nothing  else.  This 
body  is  composed  of  the  pastors  of  the  Catholic  Church.  There- 
fore the  pastors  of  the  Catholic  Church  have  authority  to  make 
an  unerring  decision,  that  is,  have  infallible  authority  to  declare 
the  word  of  God. 

Mr.  Thornwell  does  not  deny,  that,  if  such  a  body  exists,  it 
is  the  pastors  of  the  Roman  Cathohc  Church.  On  this  point 
he  raises  no  question,  and  we  may  regard  him  as  conceding 
it.  He  denies  the  necessity  of  any  such  body  as  Dr.  Lynch 
asserts.  He  objects,  first,  to  the  form  of  the  argument  by  which 
Dr.  Lynch  undertakes  to  prove  it.  The  argument,  he  says,  sins 
by  an  imperfect  enumeration  of  particulai-s.  It  is  a  destructive 
disjunctive  conditional,  which  must  contain  in  the  major  all  the 
suppositions  which  can  be  conceived  to  be  true,  and  in  the  minor 
destroy  all  but  one.  But  Dr.  Lynch  has  not  included  all  such 
suppositions  in  his  major,  and  therefore,  conceding  that  he  has 
destroyed  in  the  minor  all  he  has  enumerated  save  one,  he  is  noi 
entitled  to  his  conclusion.  Dr.  Lynch  has  enumerated  four 
methods : — 1.  Every  individual,  on  the  strength  of  his  own 
private  examination,  is  to  decide  for  himself, — private  judgment ; 
2.  Every  individual,  is  to  receive  books  as  inspired,  or  reject  them 
as  uninspired,  according  to  the  decisions  of  such  persons  as  he 
judges  qualified  by  their  erudition  and  sound  judgment  to  deter- 
mine the  question, — the  judgment  of  the  learned  ;  3.  We  must 


114  thornwell's  answer 

take  the  inspiration  of  Scripture  from  some  individual  whom 
God  has  commissioned  to  announce  this  fact  to  the  world  ;  or 
4.  From  a  body  of  individuals  to  whom,  in  their  collective  capac- 
ity, God  has  given  authority  to  make  an  unerring  decision  on 
the  subject.  But  a  fifth  supposition  is  possible,  says  the  Profes- 
sor, namely,  "  God  himself  by  his  Eternal  Spirit  may  condescend 
to  be  the  teacher  of  men,  and  enlighten  their  understandings  to 
perceive  in  the  Scriptures  themselves  infallible  marks  of  their  in- 
spiration. "  This  supposition  Dr.  Lynch  has  "  entirely  overlook- 
ed, "  "  strangely  suppressed,"  and  therefore  cannot  even  by  de- 
stroying the  first  three  suppositions  conclude  the  fourth. 

But  Dr.  Lynch  has  not  "entirely  overlooked,"  "strangely 
suppressed,"  this  fifth  supposition,  but  expressly  mentions  it,  and 
gives  his  reason  for  not  including  it  in  the  number  of  supposable 
methods.  Mr.  Thornwell  has  generously  furnished  us  the  evi- 
dence of  this.  After  enumerating  the  four  methods  stated,  Dr. 
Lynch  says  (Appendix,  p.  359)  : — "  I  might  perhaps  add  a  fifth 
method  ;  that  each  one  be  informed  what  books  are  inspired  by 
his  private  spirit.  But  I  omit  it,  as,  were  it  true,  it  would  be 
superfluous,  if  not  a  criminal  intrusion  on  the  province  God 
would  have  reserved  to  himself,  to  attempt  to  prove  or  disprove, 
when  our  duty  would  be  simply  to  await  in  patience  the  revela- 
tion to  each  particular  individual.  You  are  not  a  member  of  the 
Society  of  Friends,  and  your  essay  is  not  an  expose  of  the  teach- 
ings of  your  private  spirit,  but  an  effort  to  appeal  to  argument. " 
With  this  passage  before  his  eyes,  we  cannot  understand  how 
the  Presbyterian  minister  could  assert  that  Dr.  Lynch  entirely 
overlooked  this  fifth  method,  for  undeniably  the  Catholic  Doctor . 
means  by  the  private  spririt  precisely  the  same  thing  the  Pres- 
byterian does  by  God  condescending  to  teach  men  by  his  Eternal 
Spirit.  Moreover,  the  reasons  assigned  by  Dr.  Lynch  for  not 
including  it  in  the  hst  of  supposable  methods  are  conclusive,  at 
least  till  answered.  These  reasons  are  two: — 1.  That,  if  assum- 
ed, all  argument  would  be  forclosed,  either  as  superfluous  or  as 
criminal ;  and  2.  Mr.  Thornwell  evidently  rejects  it,  because  he 
appeals  to  argument,  and  therefore  against  him  it  cannot  be 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  115 

necessary  to  include  it.  These  are  solid  reasons,  and  Mr.  Thorn- 
well  should  have  met  them  before  accusincr  Dr.  Lvnch  of  havins: 
entirely  overlooked  the  method  of  interior  illumination,  and  es- 
pecially before  insisting  upon  its  being  supposable. 

Mr.  Thornwell  is  apparently  disposed  to  maintiiin  that  this 
fifth  method  is  the  one  actually  adopted,  but  this  he  is  not  at 
liberty  to  do.  The  method  is  private,  not  public,  and  cannot  be 
appealed  to  in  a  public  debate.  In  a  public  debate,  the  appeal 
must  always  be  to  a  public  authority,  that  is,  to  an  authority 
common  to  both  parties.  If  the  authority  to  which  the  appeal 
is  to  be  made  is  private,  there  can  be  no  public  debate  ;  if  pri- 
vate, interior,  immediate,  as  must  be  the  teachings  of  the  spirit, 
there  can  be  no  argument.  Argument  in  such  a  case  would  be 
superfluous  and  even  criminal.  When,  therefore,  a  man  resorts, 
on  a  given  question,  to  argument,  and  to  public  argument,  he 
necessarily  assumes  that  the  authority  which  is  to  determine  the 
question  is  public,  and  denies  it  to  be  private.  Mr.  Thornwell 
in  his  essay  made  his  appeal  to  argument,  and  wrote  his  essay 
to  prove  that  the  question  he  raised  is  to  be  settled,  not  by  the 
private  spirit,  but  by  public  facts,  arguments,  and  authority. 
He  therefore  cannot  fall  back  on  the  private  spirit.  Having 
elected  public  authority,  he  must  abide  by  it.  If  he  cannot 
now  fall  back  on  the  private  spirit,  he  cannot  allege  it  as  a  sup- 
posable method ;  and  if  he  cannot  so  allege  it,  he  cannot  accuse 
Dr.  Lynch's  argument  of  sinning  by  an  imperfect  enumeration 
of  particulars,  because  it  omits  it. 

Mr.  Thornwell,  furthermore,  is  very  much  afi'ected  by  Dr. 
Lynch's  supposed  temerity  in  restricting  the  number  of  suppo- 
sable methods  to  the  four  enumerated.  He  grows  very  eloquent, 
and  manifests  no  little  pious  horror  at  what  he  calls  an  effort  to 
set  bounds  to  Omnipotence.  All  this  is  very  well,  but  he  him- 
self excludes  the  method  of  private  teaching,  by  writing  his 
book  to  prove,  on  other  grounds,  that  the  books  in  question  are 
uninspired,  and  he  does  not  even  attempt  to  suggest  an  addi- 
tional method.  Nobody,  unless  it  be  himself,  seeks  to  litnit  Om- 
nipotence ;   nobody,  to  our  knowledge,  denies  that  Almighty 


116  THORN  well's    ANSWER 

God  might  have  adopted  the  private  method,  if  he  had  chosen  to 
do  so.  The  question  is  not,  as  is  evident  from  the  whole  train  of 
Dr.  Lynch's  reasoning,  on  abstract  possibihties,  but  on  what  is  or 
is  not  possible  in  hac  i^t'ovidentia.  Nobody  pretends  that  the 
private  spirit  is  not  supposable  because  it  is  metaphysically  im- 
possible, but  it  is  not  supposable  because  incompatible  with 
other  things  which  we  know  must  be  supposed,  and  which  Mr. 
Thornwell  undeniably  does  suppose. 

The  alleged  fifth  method  not  being  supposable,  ujiless  Mr. 
Thornwell  chooses  to  condemn  himself  for  attempting  to  argue 
the  question,  and  to  confess  that  all  his  arguments  are  senseless 
and  absurd,  nay,  profane  and  criminal,  the  objection  raised  to 
Dr.  Lynch's  major  falls  to  the  ground ;  and  as  he  does  not  pre- 
tend that  the  conclusion  is  not  logical,  he  must  grant  the  con- 
clusion or  deny  the  minor.  But  he  cannot  grant  the  conclu- 
sion without  conceding  the  infallibility  of  the  Church,  which 
he  seeks  to  disprove.  He  therefore  asserts  that  "  the  minor  is 
lame,  and  can  at  best  yield  only  a  lame  and  impotent  conclusion." 
The  minor  is  proved  only  by  removing  or  destroying  the  first 
three  suppositions.  But  this  is  not  done ;  for  the  arguments 
by  which  Dr.  Lynch  seeks  to  do  it  apply  with  equal  force 
against  the  foul-th,  which  he  must  retain.  But  the  legitimacy 
of  this  reply  is  questionable.  One  of  the  four  suppositions 
must  be  true,  for  some  adequate  proof  does  exist.  If  the  ob- 
jections adduced  are  in  themselves  considered  sufficient  to  re- 
move the  three,  they  cannot  be  urged  against  the  fourth,  for 
that  would  prove  too  much,  namely,  that  there  is  no  adequate 
proof.  If  insufficient,  they  must  then  be  shown  to  be  so  on 
other  grounds,  or  else  we  can  always  reply,  one  supposition 
is  true,  and  it  must  be  the  fourth,  because  it  cannot  be  one 
or  another  of  the  first  three. 

We  deny  the  assertion,  that  the  arguments  against  the  three 
apply  with  equal  force  against  the  fourth.  We  begin  with  Dr. 
Lynch's  argument  against  the  first  supposition, — that  every 
individual  is  to  decide  for  himself  on  the  strength  of  his  own 
examination.     This  is  utterly  impossible  ;  for  the  bulk  of  man- 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  Il7 

kind  want  the  ability,  the  leisure,  and  the  opportunity  to  acquire 
the  amount  of  science  and  erudition  necessary  to  enable  them 
to  come  to  an  absolutely  certain  conclusion  on  the  subject  of  the 
inspiration  of  the  Scriptures.  This  is  evident  to  every  one  who 
considers, — 1.  The  controversies  which  have  obtained  respecting 
the  canon ;  2.  The  nature  of  the  questions  to  be  settled,  and 
what  it  needs  to  enable  one  to  decide  respecting  the  fact  of  the 
inspiration  of  ancient  books  on  intrinsic  grounds ;  3.  That  every 
one  is  required  to  believe  the  truth  on  the  subject,  not  only  after 
a  life  of  inquiry,  and  historical  and  scientific  investigation,  but 
from  the  moment  of  coming  to  years  of  discretion ;  and  4.  The 
actual  condition  of  the  generality  of  mankind  in  relation  to  sci- 
ence and  erudition.  These  considerations  are  amply  sufficient 
to  disprove  the  first  supposition ;  for  every  one  is  commanded  to 
beheve,  and  the  proof,  to  be  adequate,  must  be  adequate  in  the 
case  of  every  one, — of  the  ignorant  slave  and  rude  savage,  as 
well  as  of  the  learned  and  gifted  few, — of  the  boy  or  girl  in 
whom  reason  has  just  da^Tied,  as  well  as  of  the  scientific  vete- 
ran or  the  grey-haired  scholar. 

The  Professor  replies  :  The  learning  asserted  to  be  necessary,  if 
necessary  at  all,  must  be  so  because  the  fact  of  inspiration  in  gen- 
eral is  not  determinable  without  it,  and  therefore  must  be  as 
necessary  in  the  body  supposed  as  in  the  individual  deciding  for 
himself.  But  the  body  must  acquire  it  either  by  investigation 
or  by  inspiration.  If  by  investigation  it  has  no  advantage  over 
the  individual,  and  whatever  proves  his  inability  applies  with 
equal  force  against  its  ability.  If  by  inspiration,  then  it  must 
have  the  same  learning  to  be  able  to  determine  the  fact  of  its 
own  inspiration,  and  the  people  who  are  to  receive  its  decision 
must  also  have  it  in  order  to  be  able  to  judge  of  its  inspiration. 
Hence  the  Professor  sums  up  triumphantly,—"  When  you  shall 
condescend  to  inform  me  how  the  Fathers  of  Trent  could  decide 
with  infallible  certainty  upon  the  Scriptures,  without  the  learning 
which  is  necessary,  in  your  \\ew,  to  understand  the  evidence,  if 
they  themselves  were  uninspired ;  or  how,  if  inspired,  they  could 
without  this  learning,  either  be  certain  themselves  of  the  fact,  or 


118  THORN  well's    ANSWER 

establish  it  with  infalHble  certainty  to  the  people,  who,  without 
your  learning,  must  judixe  of  the  inspiration  of  the  Holy  Coun- 
cil,— when,  consistently  with  your  principles,  you  resolve  these 
difficulties,  one  of  the  objections  to  your  argument  will  cease." 

(p.  51.) 

This  is  the  argument  in  all  its  force.  Its  substance  is,  what- 
ever difficulties  there  may  be  in  the  way  of  the  method  of  pri- 
vate judgment,  precisely  the  same  difficulties  are  in  the  way  of 
the  body  of  individuals  supposed,  and  can  no  more  easily  be 
overcome  by  it  than  by  the  individual  himself.  This  is  the 
common  Protestant  reply  to  our  objections  against  the  method 
of  private  judgment,  and  is  tantamount  to  saying,  that  a  man 
has  just  the  same  difficulties  to  overcome  in  simply  declaring 
what  he  believes  and  always  has  believed  as  in  determining  by 
personal  inquiry  and  examination  what  he  ought  to  believe  ;  or 
that  it  is  as  easy  to  ascertain  and  verify  the  truth  we  are  igno- 
rant of  as  it  is  merely  to  express  with  precision  the  truth  we 
already  possess  and  always  have  possessed  from  the  first  mo- 
ment of  our  existence ! 

But  let  us  examine  this  famous  argument,  which,  in  one  form 
or  other,  is  the  great,  and  virtually  the  only,  argument  by  which 
Protestants  seek  to  evade  the  force  of  the  objections  of  Catho- 
lics to  their  scheme  of  proof.  Dr.  Lynch  asserts  that  a  certain 
amount  of  science  and  erudition  is  necessary  to  enable  an  indi- 
vidual, on  the  strength  of  his  own  examination,  to  come  to  an 
absolutely  certain  decision  on  the  fact  of  the  inspiration  of  an 
ancient  writing,  whose  inspiration  is  determinable,  not  on  ex- 
trinsic, but  mainly  on  intrinsic  grounds.  Then,  says  the  Profes- 
sor, the  same  amount  is  necessary  to  enable  an  inspired  indi- 
vidual to  judge  of  the  evidence  of  his  own  inspiration.  P)at  this 
conclusion  can  follow  only  from  the  assumption,  that  the  evi- 
dence of  inspiration  must  be  the  same  for  the  inspired  and  the 
uninspired.  If  you  make  the  evidence  mediate  in  the  uninspir- 
ed, you  must  also  make  it  mediate  in  the  inspired  ;  and  if  im- 
mediate in  the  inspired,  then  also  immediate  in  the  uninspired. 
But  it  is  not  mediate  in  the  inspired ;  for,  unquestionably,  lie 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  119 

who  inspires  immediately  evidences  the  fact  to  the  one  he  in- 
spires. How,  then,  contend  for  mediate  evidence  in  the  unin- 
spired ?  Grant  this  reasoning,  and  the  author  condemns  liim- 
self.  The  evidence  is  immediate,  and  yet  he  has  written  a  book 
to  settle  the  question  by  argument  and  erudition,  both  of  which 
are  mediate.  He  has,  on  this  hypothesis,  evidently  proved 
nothing ;  for  he  has  oflered  inappropriate  evidence,  and  must  be 
mistaken  when  he  says  that  he  has  proved  the  books  enumer- 
ated to  be  "  corrupt  additions  to  the  word  of  God. " 

Again ;  the  Professor  asserts,  that,  if  the  learning  alleged  be 
necessary  in  the  particular  case,  it  is  so  because  the  fact  of  in- 
spiration is  determinable  in  no  case  without  it,  that  is,  that  a 
thing  cannot  be  true  in  the  particular  unless  it  be  true  in  the 
universal, — as  if  one  should  say,  some  men  cannot  be  black, 
because  all  men  are  not  black;  or,  some  are  black,  therefore 
all  men  are  black  !  We  presume  Mr.  Thornwell's  servant  is  a 
black  man ;  therefore,  he  himself  is  a  black  man.  The  prin- 
ciple the  Professor  adopts  is,  not  only  that  what  is  true  of  the 
genus  must  be  true  of  the  species^  but,  also,  that  what  is  true 
of  the  species  must  be  true  of  the  genus.  Thus,  man  is  an  ani- 
mal ;  but  a  goose  is  an  animal ;  therefore,  man  is  a  goose ; — 
or,  a  goose  is  an  animal ;  but  man  is  an  animal ;  therefore,  a 
goose  is  a  man.  But  the  principle,  if  adopted,  carries  us  farther 
yet.  It  is  the  denial  of  all  differentia, — the  fundamental  error 
of  Spinozism  or  pantheism.  Thus,  under  the  genus  substance, 
God  is  substance ;  but  a  moss  is  substance ;  therefore,  God  is  a 
moss,  or  reverse  it,  and  a  moss  is  God  !  Is  this  a  principle  to 
be  adopted  by  a  Professor  of  "  the  Evidences  of  Christianity  " 
in  so  respectable  an  institution  as  the  South  Carolina  College  ? 
Has  the  Professor  yet  to  make  his  philosophy,  as  well  as  his 
theology  ? 

But,  evidently,  there  is  a  difference  of  species ;  for  the  Pro- 
fessor would  take  it  as  unkind,  nay,  uncivil,  in  us,  if,  because 
he  comes  under  the  genus  animal,  as  does  every  man,  we  should 
insist  on  including  him  in  the  species  goose.  It  cannot  there- 
fore, follow,  that,  because  a  thing  is  true  in  the  particular,  it 


120  thornwell's  answer 

must  be  true  in  the  universal.  Consequently,  Dr.  Lyncli  may 
assert  that  a  certain  amount  of  science  and  erudition  is  nec- 
essary to  decide  on  a  particular  fact  by  a  particular  agent, 
on  particular  grounds,  and  yet  not  be  obliged  to  concede  that 
the  same  amount  ia  necessary  in  every  case,  whoever  the  agent, 
and  whatever  the  grounds  on  which  he  is  to  decide.  The 
amount  alleged  to  be  necessary  may  not  be  necessary  in  the 
case  of  the  inspired  themselves  to  determine  the  fact  of  their 
own  inspiration  ;  it  may  not  be  necessary  in  the  case  of  the 
eyewitnesses  of  the  miracles  by  which  the  inspired  evidence  the 
fact  that  God  speaks  to  and  by  them ;  it  may  not  be  necessary 
to  those  who  receive  the  fact  immediately  from  the  inspired 
themselves,  or  on  the  authority  God  himself  has  commissioned 
to  declare  it;  and  yet  be  indispensable  in  the  case  of  a  single 
individual  who  has,  on  the  strength  of  his  own  examination,  to 
decide  whether  a  book  written  some  two  or  three  thousand 
years  ago  is  or  is  not  an  inspired  composition ;  as  it  needs  no 
argument  to  prove. 

The  knowledge,  be  it  more  or  be  it  less,  necessary  in  the  case, 
to  determine  what  books  are  and  what  are  not  inspired,  must  be 
possessed  by  the  body  supposed,  as  well  as  by  the  individual,  we 
concede  ;  and  if  that  body  is  destitute  of  it  and  has  it  to  learn, 
it  must  learn  it  either  from  investigation  or  inspiration,  we  also 
concede ;  otherwise  wc  deny  it.  But  the  body  asserted  in  the 
hypothesis  is,  by  the  very  terms  of  the  supposition,  already  in 
possession  of  the  truth,  and  of  all  the  knowledge  necessary  to 
declare  it,  and,  in  deciding  the  question,  has  only  to  declare 
solemnly  what  it  already  holds  and  has  held  from  the  moment 
of  its  institution.  Therefore,  it  has  to  acquire  the  knowledge 
neither  by  investigation  nor  by  inspiration  ;  for  it  has  not  to  ac- 
quire it  at  all.  Unless,  then,  the  Professor  chooses  to  maintain 
that  to  declare  what  one  already  holds  directly  from  our  Lord 
or  his  Apostles  is  the  same  thing  as  for  an  individual  ignorant 
of  it  to  learn  it  by  the  examination  of  historical  documents  and 
scientific  investigation,  he  must  concede  that  the  parity  he  seeks 
U^  establish  between  every  individual   deciding  the  fact  of  inspir- 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  121 

ation  on  the  strength  of  his  own  examination,  and  the  Church, 
or  body  of  teachers  supposed,  doing  it  on  the  authority  of  our 
Lord  and  his  Apostles,  from  whom  it  received  it  immediately, 
has  no  foundation  except  in  his  own  fancy,  and  that  the  conclu- 
sions which  depend  upon  it  fall  to  the  ground. 

The  Professor's  reasoning  is  vitiated  by  his  supposing  a  body 
of  individuals  totally  different  from  that  supposed  in  the  hypoth- 
esis he  is  arguing  against.  The  body  he  supposes  is  no  body 
or  corporation  at  all ;  but  a  simple  aggregation  of  individuals 
"who  at  any  given  time  compose  it.  Between  such  a  body  and 
the  Apostles  there  must  needs  be  all  the  distance  of  time  and 
space,  that  there  is  between  the  Apostles  and  the  indi\'iduals 
themselves.  It  would  and  it  could  possess  only  what  the  indi- 
viduals composing  it  should  bring  to  it,  and  they  could  bring  to 
it  only  what  they  acquire  in  their  individual  capacity.  "  The 
mere  fact  of  human  congregation,"  as  the  Professor  rightly  con- 
tends, could  confer  no  power,  beyond  the  aggregate  power  of  the 
individuals  congregated.  Hence  the  aggregate  body,  or  collec- 
tion of  individuals,  as  well  as  the  single  indi\ddual,  would  need 
to  obtain,  either  by  investigation  or  inspiration,  the  knowledge 
necessary  to  come  to  an  infellible  decision.  It  needed  no  learned 
professor  to  tell  us  all  this,  which  is  by  no  means  beyond  the 
reach  of  any  man  of  ordinary  sense.  Indeed,  we  feel  humbled 
when  we  find  learned  men  bringing  such  objections  to  us,— hum- 
bled for  ourselves,  that  they  can  think  so  meanly  of  our  under- 
standings as  to  suppose  us  capable  of  holding  any  thing  against 
which  objectioiLs  so  obvious  even  to  a  child  may  be  urged,  and 
humbled  for  them,  that  they  should  imagine,  that,  in  bringing 
such  objections,  they  are  telling  something  recondite,  or  that  it 
is  possible  that  such  objections  can  have  any  power  to  demolish 
that  lofty  and  spacious  edifice,  the  Church,  founded  upon  the 
rock,  firmly  built  and  cemented,  which  has  withstood  all  the 
assaults  of  wdcked  men  and  devils  for  eighteen  hundred  years, 
and  against  which  the  gates  of  hell  shall  never  prevail,  not  even 
to  loosen  a  single  stone  or  to  detach  a  single  tile. 

But  this  body,  this  aggregate  of  individuals,  is  not  the  body 
G 


122  thornwell's  answer 

supposed  by  Dr.  Lynch,  and  to  prove  that  this  has  no  advantage 
over  the  individual  is  nothing  to  the  purpose,  for  nobody  cer- 
tainly no  Catholic,  denies  it.  The  Professor's  argument  is  a  sheer 
paralogism,  of  that  species  which  consists  in  proving  what  is  not 
supposed  in  the  question,  and  Avhich  is  not  denied  by  the  adver- 
sary,— a  sophism  for  which  the  learned  Professor  has  a  peculiar 
fondness,  and  into  which  he  falls  with  remarkable  facility.  The 
body  supposed  by  Dr.  Lynch  is  the  Church  teaching ;  for  he  says, 
"  the  pastors  of  the.  Catholic  Church  claim  to  compose  it."  But 
the  Catholic  Church,  as  a  body  or  corporation,  the  only  sense  in 
which  it  is  alleged  to  have  any  teaching  faculty  at  all,  is  not  an 
aggregation  of  individuals  wdio  at  any  given  time  compose  it, — 
a  body  born  and  dying  with  them  ;  but  the  contemporary  of 
our  Lord  and  his  Apostles,  in  immediate  communion  with  them, 
and  thus  annihilating  all  distance  of  time  and  place  between 
them  and  us.  She  is,  in  the  sense  supposed,  a  corporation,  and, 
like  every  corporation,  a  collective  individual  possessing  the  attri- 
bute of  immortality.  She  knows  no  interruption,  no  succession 
of  moments,  no  lapse  of  years.  Like  the  eternal  God,  who  is 
ever  with  her,  and  whose  organ  she  is,  she  has  dui-ation,  but  no 
succession.  She  can  never  grow  old,  can  never  fall  into  tlie  past. 
The  individuals  wdio  compose  the  body  may  change,  but  she 
changes  not ;  one  by  one  they  may  pass  off,  and  one  by  one  be 
renewed,  while  she  continues  ever  the  same  ;  as  in  our  own  bod- 
ies, old  particles  constantly  escape,  and  new  ones  are  assimilated, 
so  that  the  whole  matter  of  which  they  are  composed  is  changed 
once  in  every  six  or  seven  years,  and  yet  they  remain  always  iden- 
tically the  same  bodies.  These  changes  as  to  individuals  change 
nothing  as  to  the  body.  The  Church  to-day  is  identically  that 
very  body  which  saw  our  Lord  when  he  tabernacled  in  the  flesh. 
She  who  is  our  dear  Mother,  and  on  whose  words  we  hang  with 
so  much  delight,  beheld  with  her  own  eyes  the  stupendous  mir- 
acles which  were  performed  in  Judea  eighteen  hundred  years 
ago ;  she  assisted  at  the  preaching  of  the  Apostles  on  the  day 
of  Pentecost,  when  the  Holy  Ghost  descended  upon  them  in 
cloven  tongues  of  fire ;  she  heard  St.  Peter,  the  prince  of  the 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  123 

Apostles,  relate  how  the  Spirit  descended  upon  Cornelius  and  his 
household,  and  declare  how  God  had  chosen  that  by  his  mouth 
the  Gentiles  should  hear  the  word  of  God  and  believe ;  she  list- 
tened  with  charmed  ear  and  ravished  heart  to  the  last  admo- 
nition of  "the  disciple  whom  Jesus  loved," — "My  dear  children, 
love  one  another ;  "  she  saw  the  old  Temple  razed  to  the  ground, 
the  legal  rites  of  the  old  covenant  abolished,  and  the  once  chosen 
people  driven  out  from  the  Holy  Land,  and  scattered  over  all 
the  earth ;  she  beheld  pagan  Rome  in  the  pride  and  pomp  of 
power,  bled  under  her  persecuting  emperoi-s,  and  finally  planted 
the  cross  in  triumph  on  her  ruins.  She  has  been  the  contem- 
porary of  eighteen  hundred  years,  which  she  has  arrested  in 
their  flight  and  made  present  to  us,  and  will  make  present  to  all 
generations  as  they  rise.  With  one  hand  she  receives  the  cle- 
positum  of  faith  from  the  Lord  and  his  commissoned  Apostles, 
with  the  other  she  imparts  it  to  us.  Such  is  the  body  supposed, 
between  which  and  the  individual  Mr.  Thornwell  must  establish 
the  parity  he  contends  for,  or  not  establish  it  at  all.  What  has 
this  body  to  do,  in  order  to  decide  what  books  are,  and  what  are 
not,  inspired  ?  Merely  to  declare  a  simple  fact  which  she  has 
received  on  competent  authority, — merely  what  our  Lord  or  his 
Apostles  have  told  her.  What  needs  she,  in  order  to  do  it  with 
infallible  certainty  ?  Simply  protection  against  forgetting,  mis- 
understanding, and  misstating ;  and  this  she  has,  because  she 
has,  according  to  the  hypothesis,  our  Lord  always  abiding  with 
her,  and  the  Paraclete,  who  leads  her  into  all  truth,  and  "  brings 
to  her  remembrance  "  all  the  words  spoken  to  her  by  our  Lord 
himself  personally,  or  by  his  inspired  Apostles, — keeping  her 
memory  always  fresh,  rendering  her  infallible  assistance  rightly 
to  understand  and  accurately  to  express  what  she  remembers  to 
have  been  taught.  Here  are  all  the  conditions  requisite  for  an 
infallible  decision  ;  and  all  these  must  be  supposed,  because  they 
are  all  asserted  in  the  hypothesis. 

Now  we  demand  what  parity  there  is  between  such  a  body, 
which  has  only  to  state  what  it  beheves  and  always  has  believed 
on  the  inspiration  of  Scripture,  and  which  has  the  supernatural 


124  THORN  well's  ANSWER 

assistance  of  the  Holy  Ghost  to  state  it  iufaUibly,  and  an  indi- 
vidual who  has  nothing  but  certain  writings  before  him,  and  who 
has  to  determine,  by  the  examination  of  documents  and  scien- 
tific investigation  of  the  intrinsic  evidences,  whether  they  are 
inspired  or  not, — a  fact  which,  since  it  is  supernatural,  lies  out 
of  the  order  of  nature,  and  is  therefore  only  extrinsically  prov- 
able. Who  so  bhnded  by  passion,  by  pride,  by  prejudice,  or 
ignorance,  as  to  pretend,  that  such  a  body,  supposing  it  to  exist, 
can  no  more  come  to  a  certain  conclusion,  is  in  no  better  con- 
dition for  coming  to  a  certain  conclusion,  on  the  fact  of  the  in- 
spiration of  the  Holy  Scriptures,  than  an  ignorant  slave  on  our 
plantations,  or  a  rude  savage  of  our  forests  ?  Who  is  he  ?  In- 
deed, it  is  the  learned  Presbyterian  minister,  the  "  Professor  of 
Sacred  Literature  and  the  Evidences  of  Christianity  in  the  South 
Carolina  College  ! "  It  is  evident  to  any  man  of  ordinary  sense, 
that  such  a  body  can  decide  the  question  infallibly,  and  equally 
evident  that  the  ignorant  slave  or  the  rude  savage  cannot. 

To  the  dilemma,  therefore,  in  which  the  Professor  affects  to 
have  placed  his  Catholic  opponent,  we  reply  : — The  Council  of 
Trent  could,  uninspired,  but  simply  assisted  by  the  Holy  Ghost, 
decide  with,  infallible  certainty  upon  the  inspiration  of  the  Scrip- 
tures, without  the  learning  necessary  in  the  case  of  the  individual 
deciding  for  himself  on  the  strength  of  his  own  examination,  be- 
cause it  had  only  to  give  an  authoritative  expression  to  the  actual 
faith  of  the  body  of  j^ctstors  it  represented^ — and  it  could  estab- 
lish the  infalhbility  of  its  expression  to  the  people  who  were  to 
receive  it,  because,  to  do  so,  it  had  only  to  estabhsh  that  it  did 
express  the  universal  faith  of  that  body,  easily  collected  from  its 
being  received  by  the  whole  body  as  soon  as  made  known.  The 
other  part  of  the  dilemma  falls  of  itself.  We  do  not  assume, 
nor  are  we  obliged  to  assume,  that  the  Fathers  of  Trent  were 
inspired.  Inspiration  is  needed  only  where  the  truth  to  be  pro- 
mulgated is  unknown  and  has  to  be  revealed  :  where  nothing  is 
to  be  done  but  infallibly  state  the  truth  already  revealed  and 
believed,  the  infallible  assistance  of  the  Holy  Ghost,  without 
inspiration,  sufi&ces. 


TO    DK.    LYNCH.  125 

We  have  here  shown  that  the  difficulties  suggested  are  re- 
solvable on  Catholic  principles;  the  Professor  must  therefore 
concede,  according,  to  his  promise,  that  one  objection  to  Dr. 
Lynch's  argument  ceases.  But  this  one  objection  is  his  only 
objection  to  that  argument,  so  far  as  it  bears  against  the  first- 
named  method ;  and  since  this  is  removed,  the  argument,  thus 
far,  is  not  refuted.  If  not  refuted,  it,  at  least  against  the  Pro- 
fessor, is  sound,  and,  then,  the  first  method  is  destroyed,  and 
Dr.  Lynch  is  entitled  to  his  conclusion  against  it. 

There  remain  to  be  considered  the  second  and  third  supposi- 
tions. The  second,  that  of  relying  on  the  judgment  of  the 
learned,  the  Professor  passes  over  in  profound  silence,  and 
therefore  yields  it  up  as  indefensible.  It  is  remarkable,  how- 
ever, that  Mr.  Thornwell  should  do  so ;  for  it  is  really  the 
method  actually  adopted  by  the  majority  of  Protestants,  and 
abandoning  it  is  \irtually  abandoning  Protestantism  itself.  Un- 
doubtedly, Protestants  assert  private  judgment ;  but  the  private 
judgment  on  which  they  actually  rely  is  not  the  private  judg- 
ment of  each  individual,  but  the  private  judgment  of  those 
assumed  to  be  learned  and  wise  and  prudent.  Protestantism 
must  never  be  taken  at  its  word  ;  for  one  of  its  essential  prop- 
erties is,  to  profess  one  thing  and  to  do  another,  or  to  give  us 
the  name  without  the  thing, — the  sign  without  the  thing  signi- 
fied. Whoever  knows  Protestants  at  all  knows  that  they  take 
their  opinions,  not  on  their  own  private  judgment,  but  on  the 
authority  of  their  masters.  Whenever  they  do  not  do  so,  we 
find  them  becoming  downright  Rationalists,  or  absolute  apos- 
tates from  Christianity  ;  and  it  is  never,  only  as  grouped  around 
some  leader,  swearing  by  the  words  of  some  master,  that  we 
see  them  retain  anything  of  the  form  of  rehgion,  or  present  any 
compact  appearance.  The  people  are  aware  of  their  own  ina- 
bility to  decide  for  themselves  what  they  ought  to  believe,  and 
they  only  decide  what  heresiarch  they  will  follow, — what  master 
they  will  have.  Thus  they  say, — "  So  said  Martin  Luther,  so 
said  John  Calvin,  or  George  Fox ;  so  teach  Edwards  and 
Dwight,  Owen  and  Gill,  Wesley  and  Swedenborg,  Murray  and 


126 

Ballon,  Ohanning  and  Fourier,  Emerson  and  Parker."  It  is  not 
in  himself  the  poor  Protestant  confides,  but  in  some  leader  who 
seems  to  him,  for  his  learning,  wisdom,  and  sound  judgment, 
worthy  of  confidence.  If  here  and  there  a  bold,  energetic  indi- 
vidual starts  up  with  perfect  confidence  in  his  own  judgment, 
and  has  the  courage  or  the  audacity  to  proclaim,  as  the  truth 
of  God,  his  own  personal  conceits  or  convictions,  he  either 
founds  a  new  sect,  or  a  new  party  or  faction  in  the  sect,  to 
which  he  pertains  ;  as  we  see  in  the  instance  of  Muncer  and 
George  Fox,  Brown  and  Sandeman,  Wesley  and  Whitefield, 
Erskine  and  Irving,  Southcote  and  Puscy,  Campbell  and  Bush- 
nell,  Ohanning  and  Parker.  If  each  judged  for  himself,  we 
should  see  no  sects,  parties,  or  groups ;  each  would  stand 
alone,  on  his  own  two  feet,  acknowledging  no  master,  and  no 
fellow,  saying  always  /,  never  able  to  say  we. 

This  must  needs  be.  How,  except  by  relying  on  such  men 
as  Mr.  Thorn  well,  could  the  great  body  of  Presbyterians,  for 
instance,  come  to  any  conclusion  on  the  question  discussed  in 
the  volume  before  us  ?  In  fact,  they  do  not  attempt  to  ob- 
tain a  conclusion  by  any  other  means.  "Mr.  Thornwell  is  a 
godly  man ;  he  is  a  great  and  learned  man ;  he  has  investigated 
the  subject ;  he  wont  deceive  us ;  and  we  will  beheve  what  he 
says."  Here  is  the  fact,  disguise  it  as  you  will,  and  ^Ir.  Thorn- 
well  knows  it  as  w^ell  as  we  do.  We  must,  therefore,  regard  his 
passing  this  method  over  in  silence  as  a  tacit  confession  that  in 
his  judgment  Protestantism  is  not  defensible. 

Nevertheless,  we  cannot  be  much  surprised  that  Mr.  Thorn- 
well  passes  this  method  over  in  silence.  It  is  not  a  method  to 
be  avowed.  Protestant  ministers  would  have  a  short  lease  of 
their  power,  if  they  were  to  avow  it.  They  would  be  pressed 
with  a  multitude  of  questions,  which  it  w^ould  be  very  incon- 
venient to  answer.  "  After  all,  "—the  justly  indignant  people 
whom  they  have  led  might  say,— "this  private  judgment  you 
preached  wjis  only  a  pretext,  a  bait  to  catch  gudgeons.  You 
never  meant  it ;  you  only  meant  that  we  must  submit  our  judg- 
ments to  yours  !     Is  it  true  that  you  monopolize  all  the  learning, 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  127 

all  the  wisdom,  all  the  judgment,  in  the  world  ?  What  guaran- 
ty can  you  give  us,  fallible  men  as  you  confess  youi-selves,  that 
you  yourselves  are  not  deceived, — nay,  that  you  are  incapable 
of  deceiving  us  ?  You  deceived  us,  when  you  promised  us 
the  right  of  private  judgment.  What  reason  have  we  to  sup- 
pose you  do  not  deceive  us  in  other  things  also  ?  "  Such  ques- 
tions might  be  put,  and,  if  put,  it  is  obvious  that  it  would  be 
very  inconvenient  to  answer  them. 

The  first  method  is  disproved ;  the  second  is  abandoned ;  only 
the  third  remains.  This,  that  of  a  single  individual  duly  com- 
missioned by  Almighty  God  to  announce  the  fact  of  inspiration 
to  the  world,  the  Professor  does  not  attempt  to  defend  as  true, 
or  as  one  which  he  does  or  can  hold :  but  he  maintains,  that 
on  Catholic  principles,  it  is  probable,  and  therefore  Dr.  Lynch 
is  entitled  only  to  a  probable  conclusion, — not  sufficient  for  his 
purpose,  because  he  must  conclude  with  absolute  certainty.  The 
Professor  concludes,  that,  on  Catholic  principles,  this  hypoth- 
esis is  probable,  from  the  fact,  that,  on  Cathohc  principles,  it 
is  a  probable  opinion  that  the  Pope  is  infallible.  But  his  argu- 
ment involves  a  transition  from  one  genus  to  another,  and  there- 
fore  concludes  nothing.  The  single  individual  asserted  in  the 
hypothesis  is  commissioned  in  his  individual  capacity  to  an- 
nounce the  fact,  and  it  is  in  this  capacity  that  he  is  to  do  it. 
But  such  a  commissioned  individual  is  not  the  Pope,  or  Sov- 
ereign Pontiff.  No  Catholic  holds  the  Pope  in  his  individual 
capacity  to  be  infallible.  He  is  infallible,  as  we  hold,  and  as 
we  presume  Dr.  Lynch  also  holds ;  but  only  in  his  capacity 
of  Supreme  Head  of  the  Church,  in  which  sense  he  is  included 
in  the  fourth  hypothesis,  as  joined  to  the  body  of  individuals 
asserted,  inseparable  from  it,  and  essential  to  it.  Concede,  then, 
the  infallibility  of  the  Sovereign  Pontiff,  nothing  is  conceded  in 
favor  of  the  third  method  ;  for  in  the  sense  in  which  he  is  infal- 
lible he  is  the  Church,  or  essentially  included  in  the  fourth 
method ;  since  the  head  is  not  without  the  body,  nor  the  body 
without  the  head. 

The  third  method,  then,  is  not  the  method.     Then  no  one 


128  thornwell's  answer 

of  the  first  three.  Then  the  fourth  is ;  because  some  method 
of  proof  does  exist,  and  it  can  be  no  other.  Mr.  Thornvvell, 
therefore,  has  not  refuted  Dr.  Lynch's  argument.  If  he  has 
not  refuted  it,  against  him,  it  stands  good.  Then  the  method 
of  proof  is  the  body  supposed.  But  this  body  has  author- 
ity to  make  an  unerring  decision  on  the  subject  of  inspiration, 
that  is,  to  declare  unerringly  what  is  or  is  not  the  word  of 
God,  therefore  infallible  in  declaring  the  word  of  God.  But 
this  body  is  composed  of  the  pastors  of  the  Cathohc  Church. 
Therefore  the  pastors  of  the  Church  are  infallible  in  declaring 
the  word  of  God,  the  proposition  Dr.  Lynch  undertook  to  prove. 
It  would  seem  from  this,  that  the  learned  and  logical  Professor's 
shouts  of  victory  were  decidedly  premature.  It  is-  clear,  also, 
since  we  are  not  considering  what  is  or  is  not  possible  in  the 
abstract,  but  in  hac  providentia,  that  the  whole  controversy 
turns  between  the  fii-st  method  and  the  fourth  ;  for  the  private 
spirit  is  not  admissible,  and  the  Professor  does  not  defend  the 
second,  and  cannot,  and  would  not  if  he  could,  defend  the  third. 
It  is,  then,  either  private  judgment  or  the  Catholic  Chm-ch.  So 
the  Professor  virtually  concedes  or  maintains.  What,  therefore, 
he  further  adduces  in  his  Fourth  Letter,  namely,  that  it  is  as  easy 
to  prove  the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures  as  the  infallibility  of 
the  Church,  cannot  be  entertained.  There  does  exist  some  ade- 
quate proof;  this  is  conceded.  It  evidently  cannot  be  the 
method  of  private  judgment ;  for  it  is  absolutely  impossible  for 
a  field  slave,  for  instance,  ignorant  of  letters,  and  with  no  time 
or  ability  to  learn,  to  be  able  to  decide  for  himself,  on  his  own 
examination,  whether  Tobias  or  Ecclesiasticus  is  or  is  not  an 
inspired  composition.  But,  if  not  private  judgment,  it  must  be 
the  infallible  Church,  and  therefore  the  Church  and  its  infalli- 
bility follow  from  the  necessity  of  the  case.  This  necessity 
overrides  every  possible  objection.  Bring  as  many  objections 
as  you  please,  and  we  dismiss  them,  as  proving,  if  any  thing, 
too  much,  and  therefore  nothing.  Quod  nimis  prohat,  nihil 
prohat. 

Thus  far  we  have  confined  ourselves,  after  stating  the  ques- 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  ^29 

tiori;  to  showing  that  the  Professor  has  not  refuted  Dr.  Lynch  & 
argument  for  the  infalhbihty  of  the  Church.  This  has  been 
perfectly  gratuitous  on  our  part,  for  the  burden  of  proof  is  on 
the  Professor.  But  having  vindicated  Dr.  Lyuch's  argument 
for  the  infalHbihty  of  the  Church,  we  are  now  able  to  conclude 
it  against  Mr.  Thornwell  from  the  necessity  of  the  case,  the 
strongest  argument  that  it  is  possible  to  use.  Infallibility  over- 
rides all  objections  ;  and  consequently,  the  Professor,  let  him  do 
his  best,  cannot  prove  the  fallibility  of  the  Church.  Here,  then, 
we  well  might  rest ;  but  we  find  our  author  rather  an  amusing 
companion,  and  we  should  be  sorry  to  part  company  with  him 
so  soon.  We  hope,  therefore,  to  be  able,  in  an  early  number, 
to  consider  the  direct  proofs  of  the  fallibility  of  the  Church, 
which  he  has  attempted  to  bring.  In  the  meantime,  w^e  recom- 
mend him,  since  he  must  hold  his  logical  reputation  dear,  to 
make  himself  acquainted  with  Cathohcity,  before  attempting 
again  to  write  against  it,  and  review  also  his  logic,  before  he 
again  asks  his  opponent  to  reason  in  syllogisms. 


THORNWELL'S   ANSWER   TO   DR.   LYNCH.* 

JULY,  1848. 

Mr.  Thornwell  begins  his  argument  against  the  Church 
(Letter  IV.)  by  asserting,  in  substance,  that  we  are  unable  to 
prove  her  infallibility,  or  if  able,  only  by  a  process  which  super- 
sedes the  necessity  of  an  infallible  church  to  deteimine  what  is 
or  is  not  the  word  of  God.  "  It  is  just  as  easy,"  he  says,  "  to 
prove  the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures  as  the  infallibility  of 

*  The  Apocryphal  Books  of  the  Old  Testament  proved  to  be  Corrupt 
Additions  to  the  Word  of  God.— The  Arguments  of  Romanists  from 
the  Infallibility  of  the  Church  and  the  Testimony  of  the  Fathers  in 
Behalf  of  the  Apocrypha  discussed  and  refuted.  By  James  H. 
Thornwell.  New  York  :  Leavitt,  Trow,  &  Co.  Boston :  Charles 
Tappan.     1845.     16mo.     pp.  417. 


130  thornwell's  answer 

any  church."  Tlie  evidence  for  both  "  is  of  precisely  the  same 
nature."  The  infalhbility  of  the  Church — "the  inspiration  of 
Rome,"  as  he  improperly  expresses  it — "  turns  upon  a  promise 
which  is  said  to  have  been  made  nearly  two  thousand  years  ago ; 
the  inspiration  of  the  New  Testament  turns  upon  facts  which  are 
said  to  have  transpired  at  the  same  time.  Both  the  promise 
and  the  facts  are  to  be  found,  if  found  at  all,  in  this  very  New 
Testament."  You  must  prove  its  credibility,  or  you  cannot  prove 
the  promise ;  and  if  you  prove  its  credibility,  you  prove  the  facta. 
Therefore  "  you  cannot  make  out  the  historical  proofe  of  Papal 
infallibility  without  making-  out  at  the  same  time  the  historical 
proofs  of  Scriptural  inspiration."  Consequently,  if  you  contend 
that  the  i)roofs  are  insufficient  for  the  insph-ation,  you  deny  their 
sufficiency  for  the  infallibility,  and  then  cannot  assert  your  infal- 
lible Church ;  if  you  say  they  are  sufficient  for  the  infallibility, 
you  concede  their  sufficiency  for  the  inspiration,  and  then  do  not 
need  your  infill lible  Church  to  determine  what  is  or  is  not  the 
word  of  God.     (pp.  57-65.) 

But  Dr.  Lynch  proves,  as  we  have  seen  in  our  former  article, 
and  as  is  sufficiently  evident  without  proof  to  every  one  of  ordin- 
ary reflection,  that  it  is  morally  impossible  to  determine,  with 
absolute  certainty,  what  Scriptures  are  or  are  not  inspired,  except 
by  the  infallible  Church.  To  assert,  after  this,  that  the  infiillible 
Church  itself  is  provable  only  by  proving  Scriptural  inspiration, 
is  only  asserting,  in  other  words,  that  no  adequate  proof  of  what 
is  or  is  not  inspired  Scripture  exists.  But  some  adequate  method 
does  exist,  as  Dr.  Lynch  proves,  and  Mr.  Thorn  well  concedes. 
This  method,  if  not  private  judgment,  is  the  infallible  Church, 
as  he  also  virtually  concedes  ;  for  private  illumination  is  not  a 
method  of  proof,  since,  if  a  fact,  it  is  not  a  fact  that  can  be  ad- 
duced in  evidence ;  and  the  other  two  methods  supposed,  namely, 
the  judgment  of  the  learned,  and  the  single  individual  commis- 
sioned by  Almighty  God  to  announce  the  fact  of  inspiration  to 
the  world,  he  either  abandons  or  cannot  assert.  The  method, 
then,  is  either  the  infallible  Church,  or  private  judgment.  It 
cannot  be  piivate  judgment,  if  the  objections  m-ged  against  it  be 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  131 

conceded.  To  attempt,  without  answering  these  objections,  to 
show  that  equal  objections  bear  against  the  Church,  is,  for  the 
purposes  of  the  argument  at  least,  to  concede  them,  and  there- 
fore to  prove,  if  any  thing,  that  no  adequate  method  of  proof 
exists,  which  is  not  allowable.  As  long,  then,  as  private  judg- 
ment remains  unrelieved  of  the  objections  which  declare  it  an 
impossible  and  therefore  an  unsupposable  method,  the  argimient 
proves  too  much  for  the  Professor  as  well  as  for  us,  and  conse- 
quently nothing. 

This  answers  sufficiently  Mr.  Thomwell's  reasoning,  as  far  as 
it  is  intended  to  bear  against  Dr.  Lynch's  argument  for  infalli- 
biUty  from  the  necessity  of  the  case.  But  we  have  a  higher 
purpose  in  ^dew  than  the  simple  vindication  of  Dr.  Lynch,  or  the 
formal  refutation  of  Professor  Thorn  well,  and  will  therefore  waive 
this  reply  and  meet  the  reasoning  on  its  intrinsic  merits.  Mr. 
Thorn  well's  conclusion  rests  on  two  assumptions  : — 1.  That  in 
order  to  establish  the  infaUibihty  of  the  Church,  Catholics  are 
obliged  to  estabhsh  the  credibility  of  the  New  Testament ;  and 
2.  That  the  credibility  of  the  New  Testament,  when  established, 
is  all  that  is  needed  to  establish  Scriptural  inspiration, — that  is, 
to  settle  the  question  what  Scriptures  are  and  what  are  not  in- 
spired.    Both  of  these  assumptions  we  deny. 

1.  In  order  to  establish  the  infalhbility  of  the  Church,  it  is 
not  necessary  to  establish  the  credibility  of  the  New  Testament. 
All  that  is  needed  to  establish  the  infallibility  is  the  miraculous 
origin  of  the  Church.  If  she  had  a  miraculous  origin,  she  was 
founded  by  Almighty  God ;  for  none  but  God  can  work  a  mir- 
acle. If  founded  by  Almighty  God,  she  is  his  Church  and 
speaks  by  his  authority ;  therefore  infallibly ;  for  God  can  au- 
thorize only  infallible  truth.  In  order  to  make  out  the  miracu- 
lous origin  of  the  Church,  w^e  are  not  obliged  to  recur  to  the 
New  Testament  at  all ;  we  can  do  it,  and  are  accustomed  to  do 
it,  when  arguing  with  avowed  unbehevei*s,  without  any  reference 
to  the  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  either  as  inspired  or  as  simple 
historical  documents.  We  do  it  by  taking  the  Church  as  we 
find  her  to-day,  existing  as  an  historical  fact,  and  tracing  her  up, 


132  thornwell's  answer 

step  by  step,  through  the  succession  of  ages,  till  we  ascend  to 
her  original  Founder.  The  extraordinary  nature  of  her  claims, 
uniformly  put  forth,  and  steadily  acted  upon  from  the  first ;  her 
various  institutions,  professing  to  embody  facts,  which  could  not 
in  the  nature  of  things  have  sprung  from  no  facts,  or  from  facts 
pertaining  exclusively  to  the  natural  order ;  the  external  history 
which  runs  parallel  to  hers ;  the  relation  held  to  her  from  the 
beginning  by  the  Jewish  and  pagan  worlds,  and  by  the  various 
heresies  in  each  succeeding  age  from  the  Gnostics  down  to  the 
followers  of  the  Mormon  prophet ; — all  these  combined  prove 
in  the  most  incontestable  manner  her  supernatural  character, 
and  triumphantly  establish  the  fact  that  her  Founder  must  have 
had  miraculous  powers,  and  she  a  miraculous  origin. 

Undoubtedly,  the  infallibility  of  the  Church  turns,  in  the  argu- 
ment, upon  a  promise  made  nearly  two  thousand  years  ago ;  but 
it  is  not  true  that  the  promise  must  necessarily  be  found  only  in 
the  New  Testament.  A  promise  may  be  expressed  in  acts  as 
well  as  in  words,  in  the  fact  as  well  as  in  its  record.  The  prom- 
ise we  rely  upon  is  expressed  in  the  miraculous  origin  of  the 
Church,  and  is  concluded  from  it  on  the  principle,  that  the  effect 
may  be  concluded  from  the  cause,  if  the  cause  be  known.  In 
the  natural  order,  God,  in  giving  to  a  being  a  certain  nature, 
promises  that  being  all  that  it  needs  to  attain  the  end  of  that 
nature.  So  in  the  supernatural  order,  in  creating  a  supernatural 
being,  he  promises  it  all  the  powers,  assistance,  means,  and  con- 
ditions necessary  to  enable  it  to  discharge  its  supernatural  func- 
tions, or  to  gain  the  supernatural  end  to  which  he  appoints  it. 
In  supernaturally  founding  the  Church  to  teach  his  word,  he 
therefore  promises  her  infallibility  in  teaching  it:  because  the 
function  of  teaching  the  word  of  God  cannot  be  discharged  with- 
out it. 

2.  But  even  if  we  were  obhged — as  we  are  not  and  cannot 
})e — to  assert  the  credibility  of  the  New  Testament  in  order  to 
make  out  our  historical  proofs,  it  would  not  be  that  credibility 
which  would  sufHce  to  establish  Scriptural  inspiration,  nor  should 
v/e  be  obliged  to  make  out  any  facts  from  which  Scriptural  inspir- 


TO    DR.    LYNX'H.  133 

ation  could  be  immediate!}^  concluded.  As  all  ^Ye  have  to  make 
out  is  the  miraculous  origin  of  the  Church,  and  as  this  is  made 
out,  if  the  fact  of  the  miracles  of  our  Lord  is  established,  all  that, 
in  any  case,  we  could  need  to  do,  in  regard  to  the  credibility  of 
the  New  Testament,  would  be  to  make  out  its  credibility  so  far 
as  requisite  to  establish  this  fact.  We  do  not  want  the  New 
Testament  to  prove  the  miraculousness  of  the  facts,  for  that  fol- 
lows from  the  facts  themselves ;  nor  to  accredit  as  teachers  or 
witnesses  those  by  or  in  favor  of  whom  Almighty  God  performs 
the  miracles,  for  that  follows  from  the  miraculousness ;  we  can, 
at  most,  need  it  only  for  the  purpose  of  proving  that  the  miracles, 
in  their  quality  of  simple  historical  facts,  actually  occurred.  For 
this  simple  historical  testimony  is  sufficient,  and  consequently 
the  simple  historical  credibihty  of  the  New  Testament,  as  far  as 
needed  to  authorize  us  to  assert  that  the  miracles  actually  took 
place,  is  all  that  it  can  even  be  pretended  that  we  must  make 
out.  The  New  Testament  is  not  one  book,  but  a  collection  of 
books  by  different  authors,  each  resting  on  its  owti  independent 
merits,  and  the  proof  of  the  credibihty  of  one  does  by  no  means 
estabhsh  the  credibility  of  the  rest.  The  most  we  can  need  for 
our  purpose  is  the  historical  credibility  of  one  of  the  Four  Gos- 
pels, say  the  Gospel  according  to  St.  Matthew ;  for  that  Gospel 
records  all  the  facts  necessary  to  establish  the  miraculous  origin 
of  the  Church.  Consequently,  all  the  credibility  of  the  New 
Testament  we  can,  in  any  case,  be  required  to  establish,  is  the 
historical  credibility  of  St.  Matthew's  Gospel. 

This  Gospel  may  be  perfectly  credible  as  an  historical  docu- 
ment, without  being  inspired.  The  facts  to  be  taken  on  its  author- 
ity, though  supernatural  as  to  their  cause,  are  within  the  natural 
order  as  to  their  e\-idence,  and  as  easily  proved  as  any  other  class 
of  historical  facts.  They  fall  under  the  senses,  and  require  in 
their  witnesses  only  ordinary  sense  and  ordinary  honesty.  To 
the  trustworthiness  of  their  historian,  who,  in  recording  them, 
has  only  to  give  a  faithful  narrative  of  what  has  transpired  be- 
fore his  eyes,  or  what  he  has  collected  from  the  testimony  of 
eyewitnesses,  nothing  beyond  the  ordinary  human  faculties  can 


134  THORN  well's    ANSWER 

be  requisite.  Hence,  many  Protestants  maintain  the  credibility 
of  the  Evangelical  History,  and  yet  deny  the  inspiration  of  the 
Gospels.  We  have  by  us  a  learned  and  elaborate  work,  in 
which  the  author,  who,  for  learning  and  ability,  ranks  second  to 
no  Protestant  theologian  in  the  country,  maintains,  on  the  author- 
ity of  the  Pentateuch,  the  inspiration  of  Moses,  and  the  divine 
origin  of  the  Mosaic  law,  and  yet  denies  the  inspiration  of  the 
Pentateuch  itself.  Indeed,  if  none  but  inspired  documents  could 
be  cited  as  credible  authority  for  historical  facts,  human  history 
would  need  to  be  closed  at  once,  and  Mr.  Thornwell  would  find 
himself  shut  out  from  all  means  of  establishing  the  historical 
objections  he  urges  with  so  much  zest,  in  the  volume  before  us, 
against  the  Church ;  for  undeniably,  he  can  cite  no  inspired 
Scripture  for  them.  It  is  not  prudent  for  an  author  to  take  a 
ground  which  must  prove  more  fatal  to  himself  than  to  his  op- 
ponent. 

This  fact,  namely,  that  we  need  only  the  historical  credibility 
of  the  New  Testament  at  most,  seems  not  to  have  sufficiently 
arrested  Mr.  Thornwell's  attention ;  or  if  it  has,  he  must  have 
too  hastily  concluded  that  the  same  order  of  credibility  which  is 
sufficient  for  the  miracles  is  also  sufficient  for  the  inspiration. 
He  proceeds,  apparently,  on  the  assumption,  either  that  simple 
historical  credibility  is  sufficient  to  establish  the  inspiration 
of  the  Scriptures,  or  that  we  need  supernatural  credibihty  to 
establish  the  miracles.     Thus,  he  asks  : — 

"  If  the  books  of  the  New  Testament  are  to  be  received  as  credi- 
ble testimony  to  the  miracles  of  Christ,  why  not  on  the  subject  of 
their  own  inspiration  ?  Are  you  not  aware  that  the  great  his- 
torical argument  on  which  Protestants  rely  in  proving  the  inspir- 
ation of  the  Scriptures  presupposes  only  the  genuineness  of  the 

books  and  the  credibility  of  their  authors  ? They  assert  it 

[their  own  inspiration],  and  [if  credible]  are  to  be  believed 

I  had  thought  that  the  only  difficulty  in  making  out  the  external 
proofs  of  inspiration  was  in  establishing  the  credibility  of  the 
books  which  profess  to  be  inspired.  It  had  struck  me,  that,  if 
it  were  once  settled  that  their  own  testimony  was  to  be  received, 
the  matter  was  at  an  end.     But  it  seems  now  that it  is  still 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  135 

doubtful  whether,  in  the  way  of  private  judgment,^  a  man  could 
ever  be  assured  that  credible  books  are  to  be  beheved  on  the 
subject  of  their  origin  :" — pp.  62,  63. 

This  reasonino-  involves  a  transition  a  specie  ad  speciem. 
Credible  books  are  certainly  to  be  believed  within  the  order  of 
credibility  which  they  are  proved  or  conceded  to  possess,  but 
not  within  an  order  which  transcends  or  rises  above  it ;  for  nothing 
can  transcend  itself,  and  the  conclusion  must  be  in  the  order  of 
the  premises,  or  the  argument  is  a  fallacy.  The  credibility  of 
the  New  Testament  which  we  assert,  or  which  it  is  contended  we 
are  obliged  to  assert,  is  simply  historical  credibility,  or  credibility 
in  the  natural  order  ;  but  the  credibihty  the  Professor  needs,  to 
establish  the  inspiration,  is  credibility  in  the  supernatural  order ; 
for  inspiration  pertains,  undeniably,  to  the  supernatural  order, 
both  as  to  its  cause  and  as  to  the  medium  of  its  proof.  There- 
fore we  may  receive  the  books  as  credible  testimony  to  the 
miracles,  and  not  on  the  subject  of  their  own  inspiration. 

Mr.  Thornwell  evidently  reasons  on  the  assumption,  that  we 
cannot  assert  the  credibility  of  the  New  Testament  in  relation 
to  the  miracles  without  asserting  it  in  relation  to  the  inspiration. 
That  is,  a  witness  cannot  be  credible  at  all,  unless  he  is  univer- 
sally credible,  and  he  who  receives  his  testimony  in  one  order 
binds  himself  to  receive  it  in  every  order  ;  if  he  receives  it  in  one 
respect,  he  must  in  every  respect ;  in  matters  of  fact,  then  also 
in  matters  of  opinion  !  But  this  is  too  extravagant  for  any  man 
in  his  sober  senses  seriously  to  maintain.  If  this  were  once 
admitted,  there  would  speedily  be  an  end  to  human  testimony, 
and  our  I'resbyterian  friend  would  find  himself  in  a  sad  plight ; 
for  his  sole  dependence  is  on  private  judgment,  and  he  can  pre- 
tend to  nothing  better  than  human  testimony  for  his  religious 
behef.  No  witness,  unless  absolutely  omniscient,  is  or  can  be 
universally  credible  ;  and  as  no  man  is  absolutely  omniscient,  it 
follows,  if  no  one  can  be  credible  under  one  relation  without 
being  credible  under  every  relation,  that  no  one  can  in  any 
respect  be  credible  at  all.  But  we  cannot  concede  this.  Every 
day,  in  every  court  of  law,  in  all  the  practical  affaii-s  of  life  in 


136  thornwell's  answer 

which  there  is  an  appeal  to  human  testimony,  we  act,  and  are 
obliged  to  act,  on  the  supposition,  that  a  man  may  be  credible 
in  relation  to  some  things  without  being  credible  in  relation  to 
all  things. 

Every  body  knows  that  a  witness  may  be  perfectly  credible  in 
testifying  to  facts  which  fall  under  the  observation  of  his  senses, 
and  yet  be  deserving  of  no  credit  in  relation  to  his  opinions,  his 
judgments,  his  views,  or  his  explanations  of  the  causes  of  the 
facts  to  which  he  testifies.  Nothing  hinders,  then,  a  man  from 
being  a  credible  witness  to  the  facts  recorded  in  the  New  Testa- 
ment, even  though  he  should  assert  and  believe  himself  inspired 
when  in  point  of  fact  he  was  not ;  for  in  testifying  to  the  facts 
he  testifies  to  what  has  come  under  his  senses,  while  in  assert- 
ing his  inspiration  he  is  merely  giving  an  opinion,  or  offering  an 
explanation  of  certain  facts  or  phenomena  of  his  own  internal 
experience.  The  erroneous  opinion  or  explanation  does  not  im- 
pair his  credibility  as  a  witness  to  the  facts,  if  his  error  is  one 
which  he  may  innocently  entertain.  That  a  man  can  innocently 
believe  himself  divinely  inspired  when  he  is  not  can  hardly  admit 
of  a  doubt.  A  man  so  believing  is,  by  the  very  terms  of  the 
supposition,  uninspired.  He  is  then,  since  inspiration  is  a  super- 
natural fact,  necessarily  ignorant  of  inspiration,  unacquainted 
with  its  phenomena,  and  destitute  of  the  necessary  criterion  for 
determining  what  it  is  or  what  it  is  not.  What  more  natural, 
then,  than  that  he  should  mistake  certain  phenomena  of  his 
own  experience,  otherwise  inexplicable  to  him,  for  those  of  in- 
spiration, and  thus  honestly  believe  himself  inspired,  when  in 
reality  he  is  uninspired  ? 

The  Professor  argues  on  the  assumption,  common  to  all  en- 
thusiasts, that  no  man  can  honestly  mistake  the  origin  or  cause 
of  the  phenomena  of  his  own  internal  experience,  and  therefore, 
that,  when  one  says  he  is  inspired,  we  must  believe  either  that 
he  actually  is  inspired  or  that  he  is  a  liar,  a  wilful  deceiver, 
whose  word  is  to  be  received  on  no  subject  whatever.  There  is 
no  reason  for  this  assumption.  He  who  is  inspired,  undoubted- 
ly, knows  the  fiict,  and  is  as  incapable  of  being  deceived  in 


TO    DR.    LYNCH. 


137 


relation  to  it  as  he  is  of  deceiving  others  ;  but  from  this  it  by  no 
means  follows  that  a  man  who  is  not  inspired  must  always 
know  that  he  is  not.  Inspiration  is,  sometimes,  at  least,  neces- 
sary to  enable  us  to  determine  what  is  not  inspiration,  as  well  as 
to  determine  what  is.  He  is  httle  versed  in  the  natural  history 
of  enthusiasm,  who  has  yet  to  loam  that  honest  men,  men  of 
rare  gifts  and  inflexible  principles,  whose  word  on  any  subject 
within  the  range  of  sensible  observation  we  would  not  hesitate 
a  moment  to  take,  not  unfrequently  labor  under  the  impression 
that  they  hold  immediate  intercourse  with  the  Almighty,  are 
inspired,  or  divinely  illuminated,  when  such  is  far  from  being 
the  fact.  Witness,  for  instance,  Jacob  Boehmen,  George  Fox, 
and  Emanuel  Swedenborg.  These  men  are  not  inspired,  nor 
are  they  liars.  They  do  not  intend  to  deceive,  and  are  not  even 
deceived  themselves  as  to  the  facts  of  their  internal  experience, 
from  which  they  infer  their  inspiration  ;  they  are  deceived  only 
in  their  opinions,  their  judgments  of  those  facts,  the  explanations 
of  them  which  they  adopt,  or  the  origin  and  cause  which  they 
assign  them.  Who  dare  pretend  that  this  destroys  their  credi- 
bility in  relation  to  simple  matters  of  fact,  evident  to  their  senses  ? 
They  do  not  mistake,  they  only  misinterpret,  the  facts  of  their 
own  consciousness ;  and  who  may  not  do  as  much  ?  All  men, 
however  trustworthy  they  may  be  as  witnesses  to  sensible  facts, 
unless  supernaturally  protected  from  error,  are  hable,  as  is  well 
known,  to  err  in  their  judgments,  in  their  explanations  of  phe- 
nomena,— m  relation  to  the  origin  and  causes  of  things,  and  in 
relation  to  the  origin  and  causes  of  their  own  internal  experience 
as  well  as  of  other  things. 

The  Professor  falls  into  the  common  mistake  of  Protestants  ; 
that  the  inspiration  of  a  genuine  book,  by  an  author  proved  to 
be  historically  credible,  may  be  concluded  from  its  own  declara- 
tion. We  say  he  falls  into  this  mistake  ;  for  we  cannot  suppose 
that  he  falls  into  the  still  grosser  one  of  supposing  that  we  can 
prove  the  miracles  only  by  a  supernaturally  credible  witness, 
since  that  would  deny  that  Christianity  itself  can  be  proved,— 
nay,  that  any  thing  supernatural  is  or  can  be  provable,  and 


138  THORNWELLS    ANSWER 

therefore  that  man  is  or  can  be  the  subject  of  a  supernatural 
revelation.  If  the  miracles  cannot  be  proved  without  a  super- 
natu rally  credible  witness,  the  supernatural  credibility  of  the 
witness  will  in  turn  demand  another  supernaturally  credible  wit- 
ness to  establish  it,  and  this  another,  and  thus  on  ad  infinitum. 
We  should  need  an  infinite  series  of  supernatural  witnesses  in 
order  to  establish  the  supernatural.  But  an  infinite  series  is  an 
infinite  absurdity. 

As  we  cannot  suppose  the  Professor  ignorant  of  the  absurdity 
mto  which  he  would  fall,  if  he  contended  for  the  necessity  of 
any  thing  more  than  ordinary  historical  credibility  to  establish 
the  miracles,  we  must  suppose  him  to  hold  that  ordinary  his- 
torical credibility  is  sufficient  to  establish  the  inspiration  of  the 
Scriptures,  in  case  they  declare  their  own  inspiration.  But  the 
inspiration  of  a  genuine  book,  historically  credible,  cannot  be 
concluded  from  its  own  declaration  ;  because  inspiration,  being 
a  supernatural  fact,  falling  in  no  sense,  as  do  the  miracles,  within 
the  natural  order,  can  be  proved  only  by  a  supernaturally  cred- 
ible witness,  which  a  merely  historically  credible  witness  is  not. 
Before,  from  the  declaration  of  the  book,  the  Professor  can 
conclude  its  inspiration,  he  must  prove  its  author  a  credible  wit- 
ness to  the  supernatural.  But  no  witness  is  a  credible  witness 
to  the  supernatural,  unless  he  is  himself  inspired  or  divinely 
commissioned.  The  witness  is  not  credible,  unless  competent. 
In  ordinary  cases,  a  witness  may  be  competent,  and  not  Credible ; 
but  in  no  case  can  he  be  credible,  if  incompetent.  No  witness, 
unless  inspired  or  divinely  commissioned,  is  competent  to  testif}'' 
to  the  supernatural.  The  witness  is  not  competent,  unless  he 
can  intellectually  attain  to  or  take  cognizance  of  that  to  which 
he  is  to  testify.  But  no  witness  can  intellectually  attain  to  or 
take  cognizance  of  the  supernatural, — which,  by  the  fact  that  it 
is  supernatural,  transcends  all  natural  intellect, — without  some- 
thing more  than  natural  intellect ;  that  is,  without  supernatural 
illumination  or  assistance, — precisely  what  is  meant  by  being 
inspired  or  divinely  commissioned.  Therefore  the  Professor 
cannot  conclude  the  inspiration  from  the  mere  historical  cred- 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  139 

ibility  of  the  witness,  and  must  prove  the  author  to  be  inspired, 
or  divinely  commissioned,  before,  from  its  own  declaration,  he 
can  conclude  a  given  book  is  inspired  Scripture. 

Now,  since  in  making-  out  our  Jiistorical  proofs  the  most  which 
it  can  be  pretended  that  we  must  do  is  to  make  out  the  histoii- 
cal  credibility  of  the  books  of  the  New  Testament,  or  the  credi- 
bility of  their  authors,  in  their  quality  of  author,  merely  in  rela- 
tion to  the  natural  order,  it  is  not  true,  even  in  case  we  must 
appeal  for  our  facts  to  the  New  Testament,  that  we  cannot  make 
out  the  historical  proofs  of  the  infalHbility  of  the  Church,  with- 
out making  out  at  the  same  time  the  historical  proofs  of  the 
inspiration  of  the  Scriptures ;  for  we  are  not  obliged  to  assert 
the  credibility  of  the  New  Testament  in  relation  to  the  super- 
natural, the  sense  in  which  it  must  be  asserted  in  order  to  be 
credible  authority  for  its  own  inspiration. 

Nor,  waiving  this,  do  we,  in  making  out  the  credibility  which 
we  are  supposed  to  be  under  the  necessity  of  making  out,  es- 
tablish any  facts  from  which  the  inspiration  of  the  New  Testa- 
ment can  be  immediately  concluded.  The  Professor  himself 
says  the  Protestant  argument  "presupposes  the  genuineness  of 
the  books  and  the  credibility  of  their  authors."  In  addition, 
then,  to  the  credibility  of  the  authors,  it  is  necessary,  in  order 
to  establish  the  inspiration,  to  establish  the  genuineness  of  the 
books  ;  that  is,  that  they  were  actually  written  by  the  persons 
whose  names  they  bear,  and  have  come  down  to  us  in  their  pur- 
ity and  integrity.  Now  this,  even  if  we  must  make  out  the  cred- 
ibility of  the  New  Testament,  we  are  not  obhged  to  make  out. 
An  historical  document  may  be  authoritative  without  being  gen- 
uine. If  it  contains  a  faithful  narrative  of  facts  as  they  occured, 
it  is  sufficient  for  the  ordinary  purposes  of  history.  That  the 
Gospel  according  to  St.  Matthew,  for  instance,  does  contain  such 
a  narrative,  is  provable,  without  pro\ing  its  inspiration,  in  the 
usual  way  of  authenticating  historical  documents,  by  the  nature 
of  the  narrative  itself,  the  quality  of  the  facts  recorded,  the  cir- 
cumstances under  which  it  was  published  or  first  cited,  the  esti- 
mate in  which  it  was  held  by  those  best  qualified  to  judge  of  its 


r40  thornwell's  answer 

authority,  the  manner  in  which  it  was  treated  by  those  who  had 
an  interest  in  discrediting  it,  and  by  reference  to  various  con- 
temporary or  subsequently  existing  monuments,  especially  public 
institutions  implying,  founded  upon,  or  growing  out  of,  the  facts 
which  it  professes  to  record.  In  this  way  we  could  accredit  this 
Gospel  as  an  historical  document,  even  if  it  had  come  down  to 
us  without  the  author's  name.  Indeed,  ancient  historical  works 
in  general  derive  but  little  authority  from  the  names  of  theii 
authors,  and,  other  things  being  equal,  the  works  of  Herodotus, 
Livy,  and  Tacitus  would  have  no  less  authority  than  they  now 
have,  even  if  they  had  been  anonymous  productions.  As  the 
genuineness  of  the  book  is  an  essential  element  in  any  method 
of  proof  of  its  inspiration,  except  that  by  the  infallible  Church, 
and  as  we  are  under  no  necessity,  prior  to  the  Church,  of  prov- 
ing it  in  the  case  of  a  single  one  of  the  books  of  the  New 
Testament,  it  follows  that  we  are  not  obhged,  in  making  out 
the  historical  proofs  of  the  infallibility  of  the  Church,  to  make 
out  at  the  same  time  the  historical  proofs  of  the  inspiration 
of  the  Scriptures. 

We  can  now  easily  expose  the  fallacy  of  Mr.  Thornwell's 
pretended  dilemma.  Assuming  what  we  have  just  disproved, 
he  says  to  Dr.  Lynch,  in  his  peculiarly  sweet  and  delicate 
manner : — 

"  Now,  Sir,  one  of  two  things  must  be  true  ;  either  the  credi- 
bility of  the  Scriptures  can  be  substantiated  to  a  plain,  unletter- 
ed man,  or  it  cannot.  If  it  can  be,  there  is  no  need  of  your 
infallible  body  to  authenticate  their  inspiration,  since  that  matter 
can  be  easily  gathered  from  their  own  pages.  If  it  cannot,  then 
your  argument  from  the  Scriptures  to  an  Indian  or  negro  in 
favor  of  an  infallible  body  is  inadmissable,  since  he  is  incapable 
of  apprehending  the  premises  from  which  your  conclusion  is 
drawn.  You  have  taken  both  horns  of  this  dilemma,  pushing 
Protestants  with  one,  and  upholding  Popery  with  the  other,  and 
both  are  fatal  to  you.  Now,  as  it  is  rather  difficult  to  be  on 
both  sides  of  the  same  question  at  the  same  time,  you  must  ad- 
here to  one  or  the  other.  If  you  adhere  to  your  first  position, 
that  all  human  learning  is  necessary  to  settle  the  credihility  of 
the  Scriptures,  then  you  must  seek  other  proofs  of  an  infallible 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  141 

body  than  those  which  you  think  you  have  gathered  from  the 

Apostles A  circulating  syllogism  proves  nothing  ;  and 

if  he  who  establishes  the  credibility  of  the  Scriptures  by  an 
infallible  body,  and  then  establishes  the  infalhbiUty  of  the  body 
from  the  credibility  of  the  Scriptures,  does  not  reason  in  a  circle, 
I  am  at  a  loss  to  apprehend  the  nature  of  that  sophism.  If  you 
adhere  to  your  other  position,  that  the  accuracy  of  the  Evangel- 
ists can  be  easily  substantiated,  then  your  objections  to  private 
judgment  are  fairly  given  up,  and  you  surrender  the  point,  that 
a  man  can  decide  for  himself,  with  absolute  certainty,  concern- 
ing the  inspiration  of  the  Bible.  Take  which  horn  you  please, 
your  cause  is  ruined ;  and  as  you  have  successively  chosen  both, 
you  have  made  youi-self  as  ridiculous  as  your  reasoning  is  con- 
temptible."— pp.  64,  65. 

This  argument  evidently  involves  a  transition  from  one  genus 
to  another.  The  Professor  confounds  in  the  first  part  of  his 
fancied  dilemma  the  historical  crecliUlity^  and  in  the  second  the 
accuracy  of  the  Evangelists  in  their  account  of  the  miracles, 
with  the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures,  and  then  concludes  as  if 
they  were  all  facts  of  the  same  order ;  which  is  a  sad  blunder, 
and  little  creditable  to  the  "  Professor  of  Sacred  Literature  and 
the  Evidences  of  Christianity  in  the  South  Carolina  College." 
Dr.  Lynch  does  not  say  that  it  requires  "  all  human  learning  to 
settle  the  credibility  of  the  Scripturers  "  in  any  sense  in  which 
he  can  need  their  credibility  prior  to  the  Church ;  he  simply 
maintains  that  all  human  learning,  and  perhaps  more  too,  is 
necessary  to  settle,  with  absolute  certainty,  by  private  judgment, 
on  intrinsic  grounds,  the  inspiration  of  ancient  writings, — which 
is  a  generically  distinct  proposition.  The  "  accuracy  of  the 
Evangelists,"  which  he  asserts  can  be  substantiated  to  the  Indian 
or  negro,  is  not  the  inspiration  or  the  supernatural  credibility 
of  the  Scriptures ;  but  their  accuracy  as  historians  of  the  mir- 
acles, or  that  the  miracles  which  they  record  actually  transpired. 
As  this  accuracy  does  not  presuppose  or  necessarily  imply  the 
inspiration  or  the  supernatural  credibility  of  the  Scriptures,  noth- 
ing hinders  Dr.  Lynch  from  adhering  to  both  of  the  positions 
he  has  assumed,  "  pushing  Protestants  with  one,  and  uphold- 


142  THORNWELLS    ANSWER 

itig  Popery  with  the  other,"  however  inconvenient  it  may  be  to 
his  Presbyterian  adversary. 

"  He  who  establishes  the  credibility  of  the  Scriptures  by  an 
infallible  body,  and  then  establishes  the  infallibility  of  the  body 
from  the  credibility  of  the  Sciiptures,  reasons  in  a  circle,"  if  the 
credibility  in  both  cases  be  taken  in  the  same  sense,  we  concede ; 
if  in  different  senses,  we  deny.  But  Dr.  Lynch  does  not  estab- 
lish the  infallibility  of  the  Church  from  the  credibility  of  the 
Scriptures  at  all ;  or  if  he  does,  it  is  not  from  their  credibility  in 
that  sense  in  which  he  contends  that  their  credibility  can  be 
proved  only  by  the  infallible  body.  The  only  sense  in  which  he 
can  be  said  to  establish  the  infallible  body  from  the  credibility  of 
the  Scriptures  is  their  simple  historical  credibility ;  the  sense  in 
which  he  asserts  the  infallible  body  as  necessary  to  prove  their 
credibiHty  is  their  credibility  as  inspired  writings.  As  they  can 
have  the  former  without  having  the  latter,  we  may,  without  any 
vicious  circle,  take  the  facts  we  need  to  prove  the  infallible  body 
from  their  historical  credibility,  and  then  take  the  infallible  body 
to  prove  their  inspiration,  or  supernatural  credibility,  although 
we  are,  as  we  have  shown,  under  no  necessity  of  doing  so. 
Does  the  Professor  deny  that  we  can  do  so  ?  Does  he  contend 
that  this  would  be  to  reason  in  a  vicious  circle  ?  What,  then, 
shall  we  say  of  his  own  reasoning  for  the  inspiration  of  the  New 
Testament  ?  If  he  denies  the  distinction  we  have  made,  the 
historical  credibility  of  the  New  Testament  and  its  inspiration 
are  one  and  the  same  thing, — convertible  terms.  Then  we  re- 
tort his  argument.  He  says  the  infallibility  of  the  Church 
"  turns  upon  a  promise  which  is  said  to  have  been  made  nearly 
two  thousand  years  ago, — the  inspiration  of  the  New  Testament 
turns  upon  facts  which  are  said  to  have  transpired  at  the  same 
time.  Both  the  promise  and  the  facts  are  to  be  found,  if  found 
at  all,  in  this  very  Neiu  Testament. "  Here  it  is  positively  as- 
serted that  the  focts  which  prove  the  inspiration  can  nowhere  be 
found  but  in  the  New  Testament  itself  Then  they  must  be 
taken  on  its  credibihty.  But  credibility  and  inspiration,  accord- 
ing to  him,  are  one  and  the  same  thing,  convertible  terms. 


TO    DR.    LYKCH.  143 

Then  he  must  take  the  inspiration  of  the  New  Testament  to 
prove  the  facts,  and  then  the  facts  to  prove  the  inspiration.  If 
this  be  not  to  reason  in  a  circle,  we  are  "  at  a  loss  to  apprehend 
the  nature  of  that  sophism." 

Now  one  of  two  thino-s  must  be  true  ;  either  this  reasoninor  is 
valid,  or  it  is  not.  If  it  is,  Mr.  Thoi-nwell  cannot  make  out  the 
inspiration  of  the  Scriptures  ;  for  "  a  circulating  syllogism  proves 
nothing."  If  it  is  not,  he  fails  to  refute  Dr  Lynch,  and  then  is 
refuted  by  him,  as  we  proved  in  our  former  article.  In  either 
case,  he  is  refuted.  "  Take  which  horn  you  please,  your  cause 
is  ruined."  Although  the  Professor  says  "  it  is  rather  difficult 
to  be  on  both  sides  of  the  same  question  at  the  same  time,"  yet 
he  contrives  to  surmount  the  difficulty.  He  assumes  that  this 
reasoning  is  not  valid,  by  urging,  in  spite  of  it,  his  own  argu- 
ment for  Scriptural  inspiration,  and  that  it  is  valid,  by  urging  it 
against  Dr.  Lynch.  We  may,  then,  reply  to  him  in  his  own 
choice  language  : — "  Take  vv^hich  horn  you  please,  your  cause  is 
ruined ;  and  as  you  have  successively  chosen  both,  you  have 
made  yourself  as  ridiculous  as  your  reasoning  is  contemptible." 

But  even  this  is  not  the  worst.  Mr.  Thornwell's  conclusion 
rests  on  the  assumption  that  the  Scriptures  declare  their  own 
inspiration,  that  their  inspiration  "  is  a  matter "  which  "  may 
be  easily  gathered  from  their  own  pages."  "  They  assert,"  he 
maintains,  "  their  own  inspiration,  and,  if  credible,  are  to  be 
beheved."  But,  granting  that  they  declare  their  own  inspira- 
tion, we  have  shown  that  it  does  not  necessarily  follow  that  they 
are  inspired,  because,  to  render  their  own  testimony  sufficient  for 
that,  they  must  be  proved  to  be  supernaturally  credible,  since 
inspiration  is  a  supernatural  fact,  provable  only  by  a  supernat- 
urally credible  witness,  and  the  only  credibility,  if  any,  which  the 
Professor  can  claim  for  them  is  simple  historical  credibility.  He 
binds  himself  to  reason  from  our  premises,  because  he  says  we 
cannot  make  out  the  historical  proofs  of  the  Church  without 
making  out  at  the  same  time  the  historical  proofs  of  inspiration. 
Consequently,  since  the  historical  credibihty  of  the  Scriptures  is 
all  that  we,  at  most,  can  be  obliged  to  make  out,  it  is  all  the 


144  THORN  well's    ANSWER 

Professor  can  have  as  the  principle  from  which  to  reason  against 
us.  This  is  conchisive  against  him.  But  waiving  this,  waiving 
the  objection  to  the  order  of  credibility,  and  giving — what  we  do 
not  concede — that  we  must  make  out  the  genuineness  of  the 
books  it  is  pretended  we  must  cite,  still  he  cannot  conclude 
Scriptural  inspiration,  because  no  one  of  the  books  whose  histori- 
cal credibility  we  need  or  can  need  declares  its  oivn  inspira- 
tion. We  have  shown,  that  for  our  purpose  it  suffices,  in  any 
case,  to  establish  the  credibility  of  one  of  the  Four  Gospels  as 
an  historical  document.  ]3ut  no  one  of  the  Four  Gospels  de- 
clares or  intimates  that  it  is  inspired  Scripture,  or  even  asserts 
the  inspiration  of  any  other  of  the  Scriptural  books.  Conse- 
quently, the  Professor  has  not  even  its  own  declaration  for  the 
inspiration  of  Scripture,  and  must  be  mistaken  in  saying  that 
Scriptural  inspiration  is  a  matter  which  "  may  be  easily  gathered 
from  "  the  pages  of  the  Scriptures  themselves. 

But,  adds  the  Professor,  "  you  [Dr.  Lynch]  have  yourself  ad- 
mitted that  the  teaching  of  the  Apostles  was  supernaturally  pro- 
tected from  error,  and  if  their  oral  instructions  were  dictated 
by  the  Holy  Ghost,  why  should  that  august  and  glorious  Visit- 
ant desert  them  when  they  took  the  2^cn  to  accomplish  the  same 
object  when  absent,  which,  when  present,  they  accomplished  by 
the  tongue  ?  "  (p.  62.)  The  question  is  irreverent  and  imper- 
tinent. We  have  no  right  to  demand  of  the  Holy  Ghost  the 
reasons  of  what  he  does  or  does  not  do.  It  is  competent  for 
him,  if  such  be  his  pleasure,  to  inspire  men  for  one  thing  and 
not  for  another,  to  inspire  them  to  teach  and  not  to  write,  to  enable 
them  to  accomplish  a  given  object  by  one  method  and  not  by 
another  method  ;  and  the  Professor  cannot  say  that  he  does  not, 
because  he  sees  no  reason  why  he  should.  The  Holy  Ghost 
may  have  reasons  not  known  to  the  learned  Professor  of  Sacred 
Literature,  &c.,  in  the  South  Carolina  College. 

Dr  Lynch  admits  that  the  teaching  of  the  Apostles  was  su- 
pernaturally protected  from  error,  and  we  must  prove  that  it  was, 
or  not  prove  the  infallibility  of  the  Church  ;  but  that  it  there- 
fore necessarily  follows  that  they  were  insjnred  as  authors,  or 

1 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  145 

even  as  teachers,  we  neither  admit  nor  are  bound  to  admit.  To 
be  inspired,  is,  undoubtedly,  to  be  supernaturally  protected  from 
error,  but  to  be  supernaturally  protected  from  error  is  not  neces- 
sarily to  be  inspired.  Every  Catholic  believes  his  Church  super- 
naturally protected  from  eiTor ;  but  no  one  beheves  her  to  be 
inspired.  As  all  Cathohcs  make  this  distinction.  Dr.  Lynch's 
admission  is  no  admission  of  inspiration  even  in  the  teaching  of 
the  Apostles.  Inspu-ation  is  necessary  only  when  the  mission  is 
to  reveal  truth ;  when  the  mission  is  simply  to  teach  a  revelation 
already  consummated,  supernatural  assistance,  without  inspir- 
ation, is  all  that  is  needed.  If  the  mission  of  the  Apostles  wa? 
simply  to  teach  a  revelation  which  they  had  received  through 
their  personal  intercourse  with  their  Master,  while  he  was  yet 
with  them  in  the  flesh, — and  prior  to  the  Church,  this  certainly 
is  all  that  we  can  be  required  to  establish, — they  had  no  need 
of  inspiration,  either  as  teachers  or  as  writers,  in  order  to  be 
supernaturally  protected  from  error.  To  concede  or  to  assert 
such  protection,  then,  is  not  to  concede  or  assert  their  inspiration. 
We  certainly  cannot  be  required  to  make  out  for  the  Apostles 
any  thing  more  than  we  claim  for  the  Church,  and  since  all  we 
claim  for  her  is  supernatural  protection  from  error  in  teaching  a 
revelation  already  consummated,  this  is  all  that  we  can  be  obliged 
to  make  out  for  them. 

Nor  does  the  inspiration  of  the  Apostles  or  of  their  writings 
follow  immediately  from  the  facts  on  which  we  must  rely  in  order 
to  prove  the  infaUibility  of  the  Apostles,  or  their  supernatural 
protection  from  error.  The  facts  on  which  we  do  and  must  rely 
are  the  miracles.  These  do  not  of  themselves  prove  the  inspir- 
ation, but  simply  the  di^dne  commission  of  him  by  or  in  fa^•or 
of  whom  Almighty  God  works  them,  on  the  principle  asserted 
by  St.  Nicodemus  : — "  Rabbi,  we  know  thou  art  come  a  teacher 
from  God ;  for  no  man  can  do  the  miracles  which  thou  doest, 
unless  God  be  with  him."  The  divine  commission  follows  neces- 
sarily from  the  miracles,  and  the  supernatural  protection  from 
error,  or  the  infallibility,  follows  necessarily  from  the  divine  com- 
mission.    But  the  inspiration  does  not,  because  the  teacher  may 


146  thornwell's  answer 

be  commissioned  to  teach,  and  may  teacli  infallibly,  without  being 
inspired.  Even  Apostolic  inspiration,  then,  cannot  be  immedi- 
ately concluded  from  the  facts  on  which  we  must  rely  ;  then  a 
fortiori^  not  the  writings  of  the  Apostles.  We  say  immediately, 
for  to  say  it  can  be  mediately  is  nothing  to  the  purpose.  We 
ourselves  hold  that  the  inspiration  both  of  the  Old  Testament 
and  the  New  can  be  mediately  proved,  that  is,  through  the  teach- 
ing of  the  Church,  proved  by  the  miracles  to  be  supernaturally 
protected  from  error. 

But  the  Professor  contmues, — "  The  Apostles  themselves  de- 
clare their  writings  possessed  the  same  authority  with  their  oral 
mstructions.  Peter  ranks  the  Epistles  of  Paul  with  the  Scrip- 
tures of  the  Old  Testament,  which  were  confessed  to  be  inspired ; 
and  Paul  exhorts  the  Thessalonians  to  hold  fast  the  traditions 
they  had  received  from  him,  either  by  word  or  epistle."  (p.  62.) 
That  the  Apostles  anywhere  declare  their  writings  possess  the 
same  authority  with  their  oral  instructions,  we  have  not  found  in 
any  of  the  writings  attributed  to  them  with  which  we  are  ac- 
quainted ;  and  if  thoy  did,  it  would  not  be  sufficient,  for  the 
question  at  this  moment  relates,  not  to  the  authority,  but  to  the 
inspiration,  of  the  Scriptures,  and  it  is  not  yet  proved  that  even 
the  oral  instructions  of  the  Apostles  were  inspired. 

The  Epistles  of  St.  Peter  and  of  St.  Paul  are  not  admissible 
testimony,  because  they  are  not  included  in  that  portion  of  the 
New  Testament  whose  credibility  we  can,  in  any  case,  be  obliged 
to  make  out.  We  can  have  no  occasion  for  their  testimony, 
prior  to  the  Church  ;  and  as  the  Professor  binds  himself  to  the 
testimony  we  must  use,  or  to  what  necessarily  follows  immedi- 
ately from  it,  he  cannot  use  it.  The  question  now  before  us  is, 
not  whether  he  can  or  cannot,  without  the  Church,  prove  the 
inspiration  of  the  Scriptures,  but  whether  he  can  prove  it  from 
the  facts  which  we  must  prove  in  order  to  prove  the  infallibility 
of  the  Church. 

St.  Paul  was  not  one  of  the  tw^elve ;  his  vocation  was  subse- 
quent to  the  establishment  of  the  Church ;  and  in  no  case  can 
it  bo  necessary  for  us  even  to  establish  his  divine  commission  in 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  147 

order  to  establish  the  miraculous  origin  of  the  Church,  from  which 
her  infallibility  immediately  follows.  But  even  if  the  Professor 
could  cite  the  authority  of  St.  Paul,  he  would  be  obliged  to  make 
out,  before  his  citation  would  avail  him  any  thing, — 1.  Thftt  St. 
Paul's  oral  instruction  was  inspired ;  2.  That  the  Epistle  to  the 
Thessalonians  is  genuine  ;  3.  That  the  Epistle  to  which  he  refers 
in  it  wa.>^  the  Epistles  which  we  now  have  under  his  name  ;  and, 
4.  That  these  Epistles  are  possessed  by  us  precisely  as  he  wrote 
them.  Here  are  four  facts  not  easy  to  make  out,  and  which  the 
Professor  must  make  out  for  himself ;  for  we  are  under  no  obli- 
gation to  make  them  out  for  him,  and  they  do  not  follow  neces- 
sarily from  any  thing  we  are  bound  to  make  out. 

The  divine  commission  of  St.  Peter  as  one  of  the  Apostles, 
we,  of  course,  are  obhged  to  make  out ;  but  uhi  Feints,  ihi 
Ecclesia — when  we  have  done  that,  we  have,  in  fact,  made  out 
our  infalhble  Church.  Let  this,  however,  pass  for  the  present. 
Though  we  are  obliged  to  make  out  the  divine  commission  of 
St.  Peter  as  one  of  the  twelve,  we  are  not  obhged  to  make  out 
his  inspiration,  or  the  authenticity  or  genuineness  of  the  Epistles 
attributed  to  him.  The  Epistle  the  Professor  cites  is  no  author- 
ity till  its  authenticity  and  genuineness  are  proved,  and  it  hap- 
pens to  be  precisely  one  of  those  books  of  the  Xew  Testament 
whose  authenticity  and  genuineness  Protestant  theologians,  at 
least  many  of  them,  call  in  question.  But  granting  its  genuine- 
ness, it  avails  nothing  till  the  Professor  proves  that  the  Epistles 
of  St.  Paul  to  which  it  refers  are  those  we  now  have,  and  that 
we  have  them  as  St.  Paul  wrote  them  ;  for  the  Professor  is  not 
merely  to  prove  that  there  were  inspired  writings,  but  he  is  to 
prove  what  writings  now  possessed  by  us  are  or  are  not  to  be 
received  as  inspired  Scripture.  But  even  suppose  this  done,  it 
does  not  follow  that  these  Epistles  are  inspired.  St.  Peter  does 
not,  as  the  Professor  asserts,  "  rank  them  with  the  Scriptures  of 
the  Old  Testament,  which  were  confessed  to  be  inspired,"  but 
simply  with  "the  other  Scriptures."  What  Scriptures  these 
were,  whether  inspired  or  uninspired,  the  Professor  may  or  may 
not  have  some  means  of  knowing,  but  St.  Peter,  in  the  writings 


148  thornwell's  answer 

attributed  to  liim,  nowhere  informs  him.  That  the  Scriptures 
of  the  Old  Testament  were  confessed  to  be  inspired,  we  know 
from  tradition  and  the  Church,  but  not  from  the  New  Testament. 
From  the  New  Testament  alone  we  can  prove  neither  that  the 
books  of  the  Old  Testament  were  inspired,  nor  of  what  books 
the  Old  Testament  consisted.  St.  Paul  tells  us,  indeed,  that  "  all 
Scripture  divinely  inspired  is  profitable,"  &c.,  but  he  nowhere 
tells  us  what  books  or  portions  of  books  are  divinely  inspired 
Scripture.  It  is  not  true,  then,  that  the  inspiration  of  the  Scrip- 
tures can  "  be  easily  collected  from  their  own  pages."  Then  the 
whole  argument  of  the  Professor  falls  to  the  ground ;  for  even 
if  their  own  testimony  were  to  be  received,  it  would  still  be  nec- 
essary to  have  the  infallible  body  to  prove  their  inspiration,  since 
they  themselves  do  not  assert  it. 

We  are  not  surprised  that  Mr.  Thornwell  should  strive  earn- 
estly to  convict  his  Catholic  opponent  of  reasoning  in  a  vicious 
circle.  He  must,  as  a  Protestant,  do  so.  Protestantism  would 
abnegate  herself,  should  she  once  concede  that  it  is  possible  for 
us  to  prove  the  infallibility  of  the  Church,  without  having  re- 
course to  the  supernatural  authority  of  the  Scriptures.  It  is 
with  the  Protestant,  therefore,  a  matter  of  life  and  death.  If 
h(i  fails,  it  is  all  over  with  his  cherished  Protestanism.  Her 
friends  must  follow  her  in  long  and  sad  procession  to  her  final 
resting-place,  howl  their  ^vild  requiem,  and  leave  the  night-shade 
to  grow  over  her  grave,  and  return  to  their  desolate  hearths, 
with  none  to  comfort  them.  What,  indeed,  is  the  essential  prin- 
ciple of  Protestantism,  in  so  far  as  she  pretends  to  be  dis- 
tinguished from  the  open  and  total  rejection  of  all  supernatural 
religion  ?  What  is  it,  but  the  assertion  that  the  Bible  is  the 
original  and  only  source  or  authority  from  which  Christianity  is 
to  be  taken  ?  Every  body  knows  that  this  is  her  essential,  her 
fundamental  principle,  in  every  sense  in  which  she  can  even  pre- 
tend to  be  a  rehgion.  To  admit  it  to  be  possible  for  us  to  estab- 
lish the  infallibility  of  the  Church  without  the  Scriptures,  or 
without  their  supernatural  authority,  would  be  to  siitrender  this 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  149 

principle,  and  with  it  Protestantism  herself,  as  far  as  she  can 
claim  to  be  distinguishable  from  infidelity. 

All  Protestants  know  this,  and  hence  they  always  assert  that 
we  do  and  must  reason  in  a  \dcious  circle.  It  would  be  so  con 
venient,  it  is  so  necessary,  for  them,  that  we  should,  they  have 
for  so  long  a  time  so  uniformly  and  so  confidently  asserted  that 
we  do,  that  it  is  hard  for  them  now  to  admit,  or  even  to  believe, 
that  we  do  not  and  need  not.  Like  inveterate  story-tellers,  they 
appear  to  have  come  at  last,  by  dint  of  long  and  continued  re- 
petition, to  believe  their  own  falsehoods, — the  last  infirmity  of 
the  credulous  and  the  untruthful.  Indeed,  we  can  hardly  doubt 
that  the  great  body  of  Protestants  really  do  labor  under  the 
hallucination,  that  we  must,  in  order  to  estabHsh  the  Church, 
first  estabhsh,  in  the  usual  Protestant  way,  the  authority  of  the 
Scriptures  as  inspired  documents ;  and  as  we  contend  that  the 
infallibility  of  the  Church  is  necessary  to  prove  their  inspiration, 
that  we  must  prove  the  inspiration  by  the  Church,  and  the 
Church  by  the  inspiration, — a  manifest  ^^cious  circle.  But  as  a 
circle  proves  nothing,  they  think  they  may  well  say,  that  in 
proving  the  Christian  religion  we  have  and  can  have  no  advan- 
tage over  them.  Grant,  say  they,  we  must  prove  the  credibility 
of  the  Scriptures  before  we  can  conclude  their  inspiration,  from 
which  we  take  our  faith,  you  must  prove  the  same  credibility 
before  you  can  conclude  the  infalhbility  of  the  Church,  from 
which  you  are  to  take  yours,  and  you  have  and  can  have,  prior 
to  the  Church,  no  means  of  proving  that  credibility  which  we 
have  not. 

When  the  credibility  is  once  established,  our  difficulties  are 
ended,  for  the  inspiration  is  easily  collected  from  the  express 
declaration  of  the  Scriptures  themselves ;  but  the  infallibility  of 
the  Church  is  not.  We  have  the  express  authority  of  the  di- 
vinely accredited  witness,  but  you  have  only  your  own  interpret- 
ations or  constructions  of  certain  texts,  in  w^hich  you  may  err ; 
and  if  you  do  not,  you  cannot  assert  that  yours  is  the  church 
intended,  without  making  a  full  course  of  universal  history  for 
eighteen  hundred  years.     How  much  simpler  is  our  method  than 


150  thornwell's  answer 

yours !  With  how  many  diflSculties  yon  encumber  yourselves 
from  which  we  are  free  !  You  have  to  make  out  all  that  we 
must  make  out,  and  in  addition  the  fact  of  an  infallible  church, 
and  the  further  fact  that  yours  is  it. 

You  may  tell  us  that  we  may  mistake  the  sense  of  Scripture, 
that  our  method  is  encumbered  with  difficulties,  that  it  does  not 
give  us  absolute  certainty,  and  that  something  easier  and  surer 
is  desirable.  Be  it  so,  what  then  ?  You  have  nothing  to  say, 
for  you  have  nothing  better  to  offer  us.  Suppose  the  Church ; 
what  do  you  gain  ?  You  must  take  it  from  the  Scriptures,  and 
the  Scriptures  themselves  from  the  same  authority  that  we  do, 
that  is,  pi-ivate  judgment.  You  must  take  it  also  from  the 
Scriptures  by  your  pri\'ate  interpretation  of  them  ;  and  you 
must  take  the  fact  that  yours  is  the  Church  from  your  private 
interpretations  of  history.  Every  step  in  your  process  of  proof 
must  be  taken  by  private  judgment,  and  we  should  like  to  know 
how  private  judgment  is  more  certain  in  your  case  than  in  ours, 
— why  it  is  to  be  condemned  in  us,  and  commended  in  you. 
Be  it  that  it  does  not  yield  absolute  certainty  ;  what  then  ? 
Absolute  certainty, — who  can  have  it?  What  presumption  for 
such  frail  and  erring  mortals  ms  we  are  to  pretend  to  it !  We 
do  not  need  it.  It  is  not  in  accordance  with  the  intentions  of 
Providence,  nor  compatible  with  our  moral  interest,  that  we 
should  have  it.  "  The  true  evidence  of  the  Gospel  is  a  growing 
evidence,  sufficient  always  to  create  obligation  and  assurance, 
but  effectual  only  as  the  heart  expands  in  fellowship  with  God, 

and  becomes  assimilated  to  the  spirits  of  the  just Our 

real  condition  requires  the  possibility  of  error,  and  God  has 
made  no  arrangements  for  absolutely  terminating  controversies 
and  settling  questions  of  faith,  without  regard  to  the  moral  sym- 
pathies of  men."  (pp.  74,  7 5.)  With  such  certainty  as  we  have 
we  study  to  be  satisfied.  It  is  not  the  characteristic  of  wisdom 
to  aim  at  impossibilities,  or  of  honesty  to  profess  to  have  what 
it  has  not. 

llius  they  reason,  and  must  reason,  wise  and  honest  souls ! 
who  assert  that  the  Bible  is  the  original  and  only  source  of 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  151 

Christian  doctrine,  and  who  define  faith,  with  Professor  Stuart 
of  Andover,  to  be  a  species  of  probability,  more  certain,  perhaps, 
than  mere  opinion,  but  less  certain  than  knowledge,  or  ring  the 
death-knell  of  their  own  system.  If  it  be  possible  in  the  nature 
of  things  or  the  providence  of  God  to  bring  an  unbeliever  to 
Catholicity  without  first  converting  him  to  Protestantism,  they 
must  for  ever  shut  their  mouths,  or  open  them  only  to  give  vent 
to  their  mortification  and  despair.  But,  happily  for  us,  the  rea- 
sonings w'hich  demand,  the  principle  of  universal  skepticism  for 
their  postulate  are  not  apt  to  convince,  and  the  assertions  of  men 
who  deny  all  infallible  authority,  and  confess  to  their  own  falli- 
bility and  want  of  certainty,  are  not  absolutely  conclusive.  It 
is  possible,  after  all,  that  these  learned  Protestants  are  mistaken, 
nay,  laboring  under  "strong  delusions,"  and  that  we  poor 
benighted  Papists  have  the  truth.  At  worst,  the  authority  on 
which  we  rely  can  be  no  more  than  fallible,  while  that  on  which 
they  rely  must  be  fallible  at  best.  At  worst,  then,  we  are  as 
well  off  as  they  can  be  at  best. 

But  are  these  Protestants,  who  would  have  us  regard  them  as 
full-grown  men,  strong  men,  the  lights  and  support  of  the  age, 
aware,  that,  in  all  this  argumentation  on  which  they  pride  them- 
selves, and  which  they  hold  to  be  our  complete  refutation,  they 
are  merely  reasoning  against  us  from  their  own  principles,  and 
not  from  any  principles  common  to  them  and  us  ?  Their  rea- 
soning, undeniably,  rests  on  the  assumption  of  the  Bible  as  the 
original  and  only  source,  under  God,  of  Christian  doctrine, — a 
fundamental  principle  of  Protestantism,  and  which  we  no  more 
admit  than  we  do  the  other  fundamental  principle  of  Protestant- 
ism, namely,  private  judgment.  They  are  very  much  mistaken, 
if  they  suppose  that  we  merely  object  to  their  rule  of  private 
judgment,  if  they  suppose  that  they  and  we  occupy  common 
ground  till  we  reach  the  limits  to  which  the  Bible  extends,  and 
that  our  only  controversy  with  them,  as  far  as  the  Bible  goes,  is 
one  of  simple  exegesis,  and  after  that  merely  a  controversy  in 
relation  to  certain  points  of  belief  not  to  be  found  in  the  Bible. 
Our  main  controversy  with  them  is  prior  to  the  Bible,  and  relates 


152 

to  the  origin  or  fountain  and  authority  from  which  the  faith  is 
to  be  drawn. 

Protestantism,  taking  it  according  to  the  professions  of  its 
most  distinguished  doctors,  is  resolvable  into  two  princijDles,  if 
principles  they  can  be  called,  namely, — 1.  The  Bible  is  the  orig- 
inal and  only  source  of  Christian  fliith ;  and,  2.  The  Bible  is  to 
be  taken  on  and  interpreted  by  private  judgment.  These  are 
its  two  rules.  It  is  nothing  to  us  whether  these  two  rules  are  or 
are  not  compatible  one  with  the  other,  and  we  do  not  inquire 
now  whether  the  latter  does  or  does  not  necessarily  and  in  fact 
absorb  the  former,  and  reduce  Protestantism  to  sheer  Transcend- 
entalism in  principle,  for  that  is  a  matter  which  we  have  already 
sufficiently  discussed  elsewhere  ;  but  we  say,  what  every  body 
knows,  that  Protestantism  professes  these  two  rules  as  funda- 
mental, and  that  they  are  essential  to  its  very  existence,  and  one 
of  them  as  much  as  the  other.  Now  we,  as  Cathohcs,  reject 
and  anathematize  both  of  these  rules,  as  Protestants  ought  to 
know.  Consequently,  for  them  to  urge  an  argument  against  us 
which  assumes  either  as  its  principle  is  a  sheer  begging  of  the 
question,  or  an  assumption  of  Protestantism  as  the  principle  from 
which  to  conclude  against  Catholicity.  Yet  this  is  precisely  the 
method  of  argument  adopted  in  the  brief  summary  of  their  rea- 
soning which  we  have  given. 

This  is  not  lightly  said.  Mr.  Thornwell's  whole  reply  to  Dr. 
Lynch  is  a  striking  illustration  and  proof  of  it.  Dr.  Lynch 
states  certain  objections  to  private  judgment;  Mr.  Thornwell 
replies.  You  cannot  urge  those  objections,  because,  whatever  their 
weight,  they  bear  as  hard  against  the  Church  as  against  us. 
What  is  the  proof  of  this?  You  must  take  the  Church  from 
the  Scriptures,  or  not  take  it  at  all ;  and  if  you  take  it  from 
them,  you  must  do  so  by  private  judgment,  for  you  cannot  use 
your  Church  before  you  get  it ;  and  as  you  can  get  your  Church 
only  subsequently  to  the  Scriptures,  you  must  take  the  Scriptures 
themselves  on  private  judgment,  or  use  a  circulating  syllogism, 
which  proves  nothing.  But  the  proof  that  we  must  take  the 
Church  from  the  Scriptures  ?     Why  you  must  take  it  from  the 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  l&J 

Scriptures — because  you  have  notliing  e.se  to  take  it  from.  But 
the  proof  that  we  have  nothing  else  to  take  it  from  ?  The  Pro- 
fessor has  no  possible  answer,  but  the  assumption  of  the  Bible 
as  the  original  and  only  source  of  Christian  faith.  Consequently, 
at  bottom,  whether  he  knows  it  or  not,  he  simply  assumes  one 
principle  of  Protestantism  as  the  principle  of  his  answers  to  ob- 
jections urged  against  the  other.  That  is,  if  we  consider  Prot- 
estantism in  its  unity,  he  attempts  to  prove  the  same  by  the 
same ;  if  in  its  diversity,  he  reasons  in  a  vicious  circle, — proving 
private  judgment  by  his  Bible  rule,  and  his  Bible  rule  by  pri- 
vate judgment !  And  yet  Mr.  Thornwell  has  the  simplicity  to 
accuse  Dr.  Lynch  of  using  a  circulating  syllogism. 

Undoutedly,  it  is  very  convenient  for  Protestants,  when  hard 
pressed  as  to  one  of  their  principles,  to  resort  to  the  other ;  but 
as  both  rules  are  denied,  and  are  both  directly  or  indirectly  called 
in  question  in  every  controvers}'  they  have  or  can  have  wdth  us, 
they  would  do  well  to  bear  in  mind  that  the  arguments  they  thus 
adduce  are  as  illegitimate  and  worthless  as  if  drawn  from  the  verv 
principle  they  are  brought  to  defend.  We  really  wish  that  our 
Protestant  friends  would  study  a  httle  logic,  at  least  make  them- 
selves acquainted  with  the  more  ordinary  rules  of  reasoning  and 
principles  of  evidence.  It  would  save  us  some  trouble,  and  them- 
selves from  the  ridicule  to  which  they  expose  themselves,  when- 
ever they  undertake  to  reason.  It  is  idle  to  attempt  to  convince 
a  man  by  arguments  drawn  from  the  principle  or  system  he  is 
opposing,  or  to  pretend  to  have  refuted  him  by  reasons  which 
derive  all  their  force  from  principles  which  he  neither  admits  nor 
is  obliged  to  admit.  In  reasoning,  each  party  must  reason  from 
principles  admitted  by  the  other,  or  from  principles  proved  by 
arguments  drawn  from  principles  which  the  other  does  not  or 
cannot  deny.  Our  Protestant  friends  ought  to  know  this ;  for 
Mr.  Thornwell  very  considerately  informs  us  (p.  72)  that  they 
are  not  "  prattHng  babes  and  silly  women,"  but  "  bearded 
men." 

Protestants  seem  to  have  inquired  how  it  would  be  convenient 
for  them  that  we  should  reason,  and  to  have  concluded,  because, 


154 

if  we  should  reason  in  a  given  manner,  it  -svould  be  just  the 
thing  for  them,  that  we  of  course  do  and  must  reason  in  that 
manner.  If  we  admitted  their  doctrme  as  to  the  Bible,  we  un- 
doubtedly should  be  obliged  to  reason  in  the  manner  they  allege. 
If  the  road  from  unbelief  to  Catholicity  lay  through  Protestant 
territory,  if  v/e  could  convert  the  unbeliever  to  the  Church  only 
by  first  converting  him  to  Protestantism,  as  Mr.  Thornwell  vir- 
tually contends,  we  should,  of  course,  be  obliged  to  make  out 
the  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  if  at  all,  in  the  way  in 
which  Protestants  attempt  to  do  it,  and  then  many  of  the  objec- 
tions we  now  urge  and  insist  upon  against  private  judgment  we 
should  be  obliged  to  meet  as  well  as  they ;  but,  surely,  some 
other  proof  that  such  is  the  fact  should  be  brought  forward  than 
this,  that,  if  it  be  not  so,  then  Protestantism  must  be  false ;  for 
the  conclusion  is  not  one  which  we  are  not  able  to  concede.  In 
reasoning  with  Protestants,  we  are  generally  civil  enough  to  take 
them  at  their  word ;  and  as  we  find  them  professing  to  hold  the 
divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  we  draw  our  arguments 
against  them  from  the  Scriptures,  because  it  is  always  lawful  to 
reason  against  a  man  from  his  own  principles ;  but  in  reasoning 
against  unbelievei's,  we  make  no  appeal  to  the  Scriptures,  unless 
it  be  sometimes  as  simple  historical  documents,  proved  to  be  such 
by  general  historical  criticism,  in  which  character  we  can  legiti- 
mately appeal  to  them.  The  assertion,  that  we  are  obliged,  by 
the  nature  of  the  case,  to  take  the  Church  from  the  Scriptures, 
is  altogether  gratuitous,  and  even  preposterous.  It  rests,  as  we 
have  seen,  on  the  assumption,  that  the  Bible  is  the  original  and 
sole  authority  for  Christian  faith.  This  is  what  Mr.  Thornwell 
holds,  what  as  a  Protestant  he  must  hold.  The  Bible,  then,  oc- 
cupies the  same  place  in  his  system  that  the  Church  does  in  ours ; 
for  this  is  precisely  what  we  say  of  the  Church.  The  Bible  is 
for  him  the  original  and  sole  depositary  of  the  feith, — its  keeper, 
witness,  teacher,  and  interpreter.  He  must,  then,  establish  the 
divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  as  we  the  di\ane  authority  of 
the  Church ;  for  only  a  divine  authority  is  sufficient  for  Christian 
faith.     To  do  this,  as  we  have  already  established,  he  must  have 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  155 

a  snpernaturally  credible  -witness.  Prior  to  and  independently 
of  the  supernatural  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  then,  he  must 
obtain  such  witness.  This  he  can  do,  or  he  cannot.  If  he  can- 
not, he  cannot  establish  the  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures. 
If  he  can,  then  we  also  can ;  for  prior  to  the  Scriptures,  we  stand, 
at  least,  on  as  good  ground  as  he.  But  such  a  witness  is  all  we 
need  for  the  divine  authority  of  the  Church.  Then  either  the 
Profassor  cannot  establish  the  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures, 
or  we  can  establish  the  divine  authority  of  the  Church  without 
the  Scriptures.  Where  now  are  the  Professor's  assumption,  and 
his  triumph  about  reasoning  in  a  circle  ? 

Again.  The  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures  is  itself  an 
article  of  faith,  because  a  supernatural  fact,  and  a  revealed  fact, 
if  a  fact  at  all.  This  can  be  proved  without  the  Scriptures,  or 
it  cannot.  If  it  cannot,  then  it  cannot  be  proved  at  all,  for  the 
Scriptures  can  authorize  no  article  of  faith  till  their  own  divine 
authority  is  established.  If  it  can,  it  is  false  to  say  the  Scrip- 
tures are  the  original  and  only  authority  for  faith,  for  here  is  an 
article  of  faith  not  taken  from  them,  but  from  some  other  source 
and  authority.  Or  in  another  form  :  Either  the  supernatural 
witness  supposed  can  be  obtained,  or  cannot.  If  the  Professor 
says  the  latter,  he  abandons  his  Protestantism,  by  confessing  to 
his  inability  to  establish  the  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures, 
from  which  alone  he  is  to  take  it.  If  he  says  the  former,  he 
also  abandons  his  Protestantism  ;  for  then  he  concedes  the  pos- 
sibility of  another  authority  for  faith  than  the  Scriptures,  which 
Protestantism  does  and  must  deny,  or  deny  itself.  The  Profes- 
sor may  take  which  alternative  he  pleases ;  in  either  case,  he 
must  surrender  his  Protestantism,  as  far  as  at  all  distinguishable 
from  sheer  infidelity. 

Thus  easy  is  it  to  overthrow  the  strongest  positions  of  Prot- 
estants, and  we  confess  that  our  only  practical  difficulty  in  refut- 
ing Protestantism  lies  precisely  in  its  weakness,  nay,  its  glaring 
absurdity.  Our  arguments  against  it  fail  to  convince,  because 
too  easily  obtained,  and  because  they  are  too  obviously  conclu- 
sive.    People  doubt  their  senses,  and  refuse  to  trust  their  reason. 


156  thornwell's  answer 

They  think  it  impossible  that  Protestantism,  wliicli  makes  such 
lofty  pretensions,  should  be  so  untenable,  so  utterly  indefensible, 
as  it  must  be,  if  our  arguments  against  it  are  sound.  AVe 
succeed  too  well  to  be  successful,  and  fail  because  we  make  out 
too  strong  a  case.  Indeed,  Protestantism  owes  its  existence  and 
influence,  after  its  wickedness,  to  its  absurdity.  If  it  had  been 
less  glaringly  absurd,  it  would  long  since  have  been  numbered 
with  the  things  that  were.  Fuit  ilium.  But  many  people  find 
it  difficult  to  believe  it  to  be  what  it  appears ;  they  think  it  must 
contain  something  which  is  concealed  from  them,  some  hidden 
wisdom,  some  profound  truth,  or  else  the  enlightened  men  among 
Protestants  would  not  and  could  not  have  manifested  so  much 
zeal  in  its  behalf, — forgetting  that  Socrates  ordered  just  before 
his  death  a  cock  to  be  sacrificed  to  ^Esculapius,  that  Plato  ad- 
vocated promiscuous  concubinage,  and  that  Satan,  notwithstand- 
ing his  great  intellectual  power,  is  the  greatest  fool  in  the  uni- 
verse,— a  fool  whom  a  simple  child  saying  credo  outwits  and 
turns  into  ridicule.  But  they  may  be  assured  that  it  is  not  one 
whit  more  solid  than  it  appears,  and  that  the  deeper  they  probe 
it,  the  more  unsound  and  rotten  they  will  find  it. 

Protestants  would  do  well  to  study  the  Categories,  or  Praedi- 
caments,  and  learn  not  to  contemn  proper  and  necessary  distinc- 
tions. They  should  know  that  they  cannot  conclude  the  super- 
natural from  the  natural ;  and  that  the  historical  credibility  of 
the  Scriptures  does  not,  of  itself,  establish  their  divine  authority 
in  relation  to  the  supernatural  order.  Historical  credibility  suf- 
fices for  the  miracles  ;  and  miracles  accredit  the  teachers,  but  not 
immediately  the  teaching,  whether  oral  or  written.  The  teach- 
ing is  taken  on  the  authority  of  the  accredited  teacher.  Conse- 
quently, between  the  miracles  and  the  divine  authority  of  the 
Scriptures  the  authority  or  testimony  of  the  teacher  must  inter- 
vene, and  whether  it  does  intervene  in  favor  of  the  Scriptures  or 
not  is  a  question  of  fact,  not  of  reason. 

Hence  it  is  easy  to  detect  the  falsity  of  Mi.  Thornwell's  gen- 
eral thesis,  that  "  it  is  just  as  easy  to  prove  the  inspiration  of  the 
Scriptures  as  the  infallibility  of  any  church."     The  inspiration 


TO    DR.    LYNCH. 


157 


of  the  Scriptures  and  the  divine  authority  or  infallibihty  of  the 
Church  are  both  supernatural  facts,  and  therefore  provable  only 
by  evidence  valid  in  relation  to  the  supernatural.  In  order  to 
prove  the  inspiration  of  the  Scriptures,  the  Professor  must  prove 
their  divine  authority ;  for  he  is  to  take  their  inspiration  from 
their  own  testimony,  which  is  not  adequate,  unless  supernaturally 
credible.  But  to  prove  the  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures, 
he  must  prove  the  di^•ine  commission  of  the  Apostles.  The 
supernatural  is  provable  in  two  ways, — by  miracles,  and  by 
divinely  accredited  or  commissioned  teachers.  The  miracles  ac- 
credit or  prove  the  divine  commission  of  the  teachers,  but,  as  we 
have  just  seen,  not  the  divine  authority  of  the  writings.  This 
must  be  taken  on  the  authority  of  the  teachers  themselves,  and 
the  Apostles  are  the  only  teachers  supposable  in  the  case ;  be- 
cause all,  whether  Church  or  Scriptures  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
comes  to  us  from  God  through  them.  Consequently,  the  Pro- 
fessor must  establish,  in  some  way,  their  divine  commission,  or 
not  establish  the  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  and  there- 
fore the  supernatural  credibility  of  their  testimony  to  their  own 
inspiration. 

This  we  also  must  do,  or  not  be  able  to  assert  the  infallibility 
of  the  Church.  The  divine  commission  is  a  point  common  to 
us  both  ;  both  must  make  it  out,— he  without  the  authority  of 
Scripture,  and  w^e  without  the  authority  of  the  Church.  If  he 
can  make  it  out,  we  can,  and  if  we  can  make  it  out,  he  can  ;  for 
we  both,  in  relation  to  it,  stand  on  the  same  ground,  have  the 
same  difficulties,  and  the  same,  and  only  the  same,  means  with 
which  to  overcome  them. 

The  divine  commission  of  the  Apostles  is  made  out,  if  at  all 
by  the  miracles  historically  proved  to  have  actually  occurred. 
These,  thus  proved,  accredit  the  teachers,  that  is,  the  Apostles, 
as  teachei-s  come  from  God,  therefore  commissioned  by  him ;  and 
if  commissioned  by  him,  what  they  teach,  as  from  him,  must  be 
infallibly  true,  because  he  cannot  authorize  the  teaching  of  what 
is  not  infalhbly  true.  Thus  history  proves  the  miracles,  the  mir- 
acles prove  the  divine  commission,  and  the  divine  commission 


158  thornwell's  answer 

proves  the  infallibility.  Thus  far,  we  and  the  Professor  travel 
too-echer.  But — and  this  is  the  point  he  overlooks — when  we 
have  gone  thus  far,  and  obtained  the  divinely  commissioned 
Apostles,  we  have  got  the  inMlible  Church;  for  they  are  it,  in 
all  its  plenitude  and  in  all  its  integrity.  Has  the  Professor  got  his 
inspired  Scriptures  ?  No.  He  has  not  yet  got  even  their  divine 
authority,  and  does  not  as  yet  even  know  that  there  are  any 
Scriptures  at  all,  much  less  what  and  which  they  are ;  and  he 
can  know  only  as  these  divinely  commissioned  Apostles  inform 
him,  that  is,  as  taught  by  the  infallible  Church, — precisely  what 
we  have  ahvays  told  him,  and  what  he  ought  to  have  known  in 
the  outset. 

Does  the  Professor  answer,  that  we  have  not  yet  proved  the 
present  existence  of  the  infallible  Church,  and  that  ours  is  it  ? 
Be  it  so.  We  must,  of  course,  establish  the  fact  of  communion 
between  us  and  the  Church  of  the  Apostles,  or  not  be  able  to 
assert  the  infallibility  of  our  Church.  But  the  Professor  has 
also  to  establish  the  fact  of  his  communion  with  the  same 
Church,  before  he  can  assert  the  divine  authority  of  the  Scrip- 
tures ;  for  he  is  to  assert  it  on  her  authority,  and  this  he  cannot 
do  until  he  proves  that  he  has  her  authority.  The  simple  ques- 
tion, then,  between  us  is,  whether  it  is  as  easy  for  him  to  estab- 
lish the  fact  of  the  communion  in  his  case,  as  it  is  for  us  to 
establish  it  in  ours.  He  must  prove,  not  only  that  it  is  possible 
in  his  case,  but  that  it  is  as  easy  in  his  as  in  ours,  or  abandon 
his  thesis. 

As  yet,  the  Professor  has  only  the  point  in  common  with  us 
of  the  divine  commission,  or  infallible  Church,  of  the  Apostles. 
The  authority  of  this  Church  he  must  bring  home  to  the  sacred 
books  with  absolute  certainty,  and  with  so  much  exactness  as  to 
include  no  uninspired  and  to  exclude  no  inspired  Scripture.  He 
must  bring  it  home,  not  merely  to  some  books,  but  to  all  whose 
inspiration  is  to  be  asserted ;  and  this  not  in  general  only,  but 
also  in  particular, — to  each  particular  book,  chapter,  verse,  and 
sentence.  This,  in  the  nature  of  the  case,  he  can  do  only  by 
proving  the  genuineness  of  the  Apostolic  wi*i tings,  and  the  iden- 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  159 

titj,  purity,  and  integrity  of  all  those  boots  which,  though  not 
written  by  the  Apostles  themselves,  are  to  be  received  as  inspired 
on  their  authority.  This  he  must  do  before  he  can  establish  the 
divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  and  be  able  to  conclude  their 
inspiration  from  their  own  testimony,  in  case  he  has  it. 

This  is  what  the  Professor  has  to  do,  in  order  to  make  out 
the  fact  of  Apostolic  communion  in  his  case ;  but  all  we  have  to 
do,  in  order  to  establish  it  in  ours,  is  to  prove  historically  the 
continuance  in  space  and  time  of  the  Church  of  the  Apostles, 
and  its  external  identity,  or  its  identity  as  a  visible  corporation 
or  kingdom,  with  our  Church.  Now  which  is  the  easiest  ?  Is 
it  as  easy  to  prove  the  authenticity,  purity,  and  integrity  of  some 
sixty  or  seventy  ancient  books,  written  in  different  languages, 
and  transcribed  perhaps  a  thousand  times,  subject  to  a  thousand 
accidents,  as  to  establish  the  external  identity  of  a  visible  corpo- 
dtion  or  kingdom,  extending  over  all  nations,  the  common  cen- 
tre around  which,  in  one  form  or  another,  revolve  all  the  signifi- 
cant events  of  the  world  for  eighteen  hundred  years,  and  no 
more  to  be  mistaken  than  the  sun  in  the  cloudless  heavens  at 
noonday  ?  We  are  to  prove,  w^e  grant,  the  external  identity  of 
our  Church  w^ith  the  Church  in  the  days  of  the  Apostles, — a 
thing,  in  its  very  nature,  as  easy  to  be  done  as  to  establish  the 
continuance  and  identity  of  any  civil  corporation,  state,  or  em- 
pire, ancient  or  modern.  But  the  Professor  has  to  do  as  much 
as  this,  and  more  too,  in  the  case  of  the  Bible,  and  of  each 
separate  book,  chapter,  and  sentence  in  the  Bible, — a  thing 
morally  impossible  to  be  done,  as  all  the  attempts  of  Protestants 
to  establish  the  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures  sufficiently 
prove. 

But  even  if  this  were  done,  the  Professor  would  not  have 
established  the  inspiration  of  a  single  sentence  of  Scripture,  as 
Scripture.  The  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures  does  not  prove 
their  inspiration,  unless  they  themselves  declare  it ;  for  the  Pro- 
fessor must  gather  their  inspiration  from  their  own  pages.  He 
can  assert  no  book  to  be  inspired,  unless,  if  it  be  a  genuine 
Apostolic  writing,  it  clearly  and  unequivocally  asserts  its  own 


ICO  THORN  well's    ANSWER 

inspiration,  and  if  it  be  not  an  Apostolic  writing,  unless  it  is 
clearly  and  unequivocally  declared  to  be  inspired  by  some  book 
whose  divine  authority  is  estabhshed.  And  even  this  would  not 
be  enough  for  his  purpose  ;  for  he  must  not  only  make  out  the 
inspiration  of  certain  books,  but  he  must  establish  by  divine 
authority  what  books  are,  and  what  are  not,  to  be  received  ii« 
inspired  Scripture.  He  must  bring  divine  authority  to  say^ 
These,  and  these  only,  are  to  be  so  received.  This  last  is  impos 
sible,  for  it  is  well  known  that  Scripture  nowhere  draws  or  pro 
fesses  to  draw  up  a  list  of  the  inspired  books.  This  of  itself  is  con- 
clusive against  the  Professor.  The  former,  also,  is  impossible,  for 
none  of  the  Apostolic  writings,  unless  it  be  the  Apocalypse,  whose 
authenticity  many  Protestants  deny,  assert  their  own  inspiration, 
and,  with  this  exception,  and  some  portion  of  the  prophetic 
books,  what  is  received  as  Scripture  is  nowhere  in  Scripture 
asserted  to  be  inspired.  Hence  there  are  amongst  us  Protestant 
Doctors  of  Divinity,  who,  while  professing  to  acknowledge  the 
authority  of  our  Lord  and  his  Apostles,  and  the  general  historical 
fidelity  and  authority  of  the  Bible,  deny  entirely  its  inspiration. 
The  Professor,  therefore,  must  be  decidedly  mistaken  in  say- 
ing that,  "  it  is  just  as  easy  to  prove  the  inspiration  of  the 
Scriptures  as  the  infallibility  of  any  church."  His  meaning  is, 
that,  i"  the  nature  of  the  case,  it  must  be  as  easy  to  prove  the 
insp'  .tion  as  the  infollibility,  which  we  see  is  by  no  means  the 
fa'"  ,  because,  on  no  hypothesis,  can  he  prove  the  inspiration  of 
*  3  Scriptures  without  first  proving  the  infallible  Church,  and  the 
Historical  identification  of  the  Church  in  space  and  time  is  a 
thing  infinitely  easier  to  make  out  than  the  authenticity,  identity, 
purity,  and  integrity  of  ancient  writings.  The  latter  can  be  done, 
if  at  all  without  a  continued  infallible  authority,  only  with  ex- 
treme difficulty,  and  by  a  few  gifted  individuals,  who  have  ample 
opportunities  and  learned  leisure  for  the  purpose.  The  other  is 
a  thing  easily  done.  It  is,  making  allowance  for  the  greater 
lapse  of  time  between  the  two  extremes,  as  easy  to  prove  that 
Pius  IX.  is  the  successor  of  St.  Peter  in  the  goverment  of  the 
Church,  as  that  James  K.  Polk  is  the  successor  of  George  Wash 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  161 

ington  in  the  Presidency  of  the  United  States ;  and  the  fact  of 
the  succession  in  the  former  case  as  mnch  proves  that  the  Church 
of  which  Pius  IX.  is  Pope  is  the  Church  of  St.  Peter,  that  is, 
of  the  Apostles,  as  the  succession  in  the  latter  case  proves  that 
the  United  States  of  which  Mr.  Polk  is  President  are  the  same 
pohtical  body  over  which  George  Washington  presided.  Even 
the  allowance  to  be  made  for  lapse  of  time  dwindles  into  insig- 
nificance, the  moment  we  consider  the  more  important  part  in 
the  affairs  of  the  world  performed  by  the  Church  than  by  the 
United  States,  or  by  any  temporal  state  or  kingdom  of  ancient 
or  modern  times. 

To  identify  and  to  establish  the  purity  and  integrity  of  an 
ancient  book,  which  has  been  subject  to  all  the  accidents  of  two 
or  three  thousand  years,  is  by  no  means  an  easy  task  ;  but  the 
identity  in  space  and  time  of  an  outward  visibly  body,  "  a  city 
set  on  a  hill,"  the  common  centre  of  nations,  and  spreading  itself 
over  all  lands  and  conducting  the  most  subhme  and  the  most 
intimate  affairs  of  mankind,  everywhere  with  us,  at  birth,  bap- 
tism, confirmation,  marriage,  in  sickness  and  health,  in  joy  and 
sorrow,  in  prosperity  and  adversity,  in  life  and  death, — taking  us 
from  our  mother's  womb,  and  accompanying  us  as  our  guardian 
angel  through  life,  and  never  leaving  us  for  one  moment  till  we 
arrive  at  home,  and  behold  our  Father's  face  in  the  eternal  habit- 
ations of  the  just, — is  the  easiest  thing  in  the  world  to  estabhsh 
through  any  supposable  series  of  ages.  You  may  speak  of  its 
hability  to  corruption  ;  but  far  less  hable  must  it  be,  even  hu- 
manly speaking,  to  corruption  than  the  Scriptures,  and  indeed, 
after  all,  it  is  only  from  its  incorruptness  and  its  guardian  care, 
that  even  you,  who  blaspheme  the  Spouse  of  God,  conclude  the 
purity  and  integrity  of  the  Scriptures.  Far  easier  would  it  be 
to  interpolate  or  mutilate  the  Scriptures,  without  detection,  than 
for  the  Church  to  corrupt  or  alter  her  teachings,  always  diffused 
far  more  generally,  and  far  better  known  than  their  pages.  If 
publicity,  extent,  and  integrity  of  the  Christian  people  are  to  be 
pleaded  for  the  purity  and  integrity  of  the  sacred  text,  as  they 


162  thornwell's  answer 

must  be,  then  a  fortiori  for  the  purit}^  and  integritjr  of  the 
Church's  teaching. 

But  passing  over  all  this,  supposing,  but  not  conceding,  that 
the  Professor  could  make  out  the  inspiration  of  Scripture,  it  would 
amount  to  just  nothing  at  all ;  for  the  real  matter  to  be  deter- 
mined is,  what  is  or  is  not  to  be  received  as  the  word  of  God, 
and  till  this  is  determined,  or  an  unerring  rule  for  determining 
it  is  obtained,  nothing  is  done  of  any  practical  moment.  To 
prove  that  the  Scriptures  are  inspired,  and  therefore  contain  the 
word  of  God,  is  only  to  prov-e  where  the  word,  or  some  portion 
of  the  word,  of  God  is,  not  ivhat  it  is.  Between  where  and  what 
there  is  a  distance,  and,  unless  some  means  are  provided  for 
bridging  it  over,  an  impassable  gulf.  We  are  not  told  ivliat  the 
word  of  God  is,  till  we  are  told  it  in  the  exact  sense  intended 
by  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  this  is  not  told  us  by  being  told  that 
the  word  of  God  or  some  portion  of  it,  is  contained  in  a  certain 
book.     How  will  the  Professor  tell  us  this  ? 

The  controversy  turns  on  the  means  of  evidencing  the  word 
of  God  to  the  Indian  or  negro.  Suppose  the  Professor  goes  to 
the  Indian  or  negro,  with  his  copy  of  the  Holy  Scriptures ;  sup- 
pose, 2)er  impossible^  that  he  succeeds  in  proving  to  him  that 
the  several  books  were  dictated  by  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  in  the 
exact  state  in  which  he  presents  them.  What  is  this  to  him  ? 
He  cannot  read,  and  the  book  is  to  him  a  sealed  book,  as  good 
as  no  book  at  all.  What  shall  be  done  ?  Shall  the  Indian  or 
negro  wait  till  he  has  learned  to  read,  and  to  read  well  enough 
to  read,  undei-standingly,  the  Bible, — which  is  out  of  his  power, — 
and  also  till  he  has  read  it  through  several  times,  and  some  five 
or  six  huge  folios  besides,  to  explain  its  unusual  locutions,  and  its 
references  to  strange  manners  and  customs,  and  to  natural  and 
civil  history,  before  hearing  or  knowing  what  is  the  message  sent 
him  by  his  Heavenly  Father  ?  What,  in  the  mean  time,  is  he 
to  do?  Is  he  to  remain  a  heathen,  an  infidel,  an  alien  from  the 
commonwealth  of  our  Lord?  If  he  needs  the  Gospel  as  the 
medium  of  salvation,  how  can  he  wait,  as  he  must,  on  the  low- 
est calculation,  more  than  half  the  ordinary  life  of  man,  without 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  163 

peril  to  his  soul  ?  If  lie  does  not  need  it,  wliat  do  jou  make 
the  Gospel  but  a  solemn  farce  ?  Suppose  he  does  wait,  suppose 
he  does  get  the  requisite  amount  of  learning ;  what  surety  have 
you,  even  then,  that  he  will  not  deduce  error  instead  of  truth 
from  the  book,  and  instead  of  the  word  of  God  embrace  the 
words  of  men  or  of  devils  ? 

The  pretence  of  Protestants,  that  they  derive  their  belief,  such 
as  it  is,  from  the  Bible,  is  nothing  but  a  pretence.  If  not,  how 
happens  it  that,  as  a  general  rule,  children  grow  up  in  the 
persuasion  of  their  parents, — that  the  children  of  Episcopalians 
find  the  Bible  teaching  Episcopalianisra,  Presbyterian  children 
find  it  teaching  Presbyterianism,  Baptist  children  Baptist  doc- 
trine, Methodist  children  Methodism,  Unitarian  children  Unita- 
rianism,  Universalist  children  Universalism  ?  Why  is  this  ?  The 
Professor  knows  why  it  is,  as  Avell  as  we  do.  He  knows  it  is  so, 
because  their  notions  of  religion  are  not  derived  from  the  Bible, 
but  from  the  instructions  of  their  parents,  their  nurses,  theii-  Sun- 
day-school teachers,  their  pastors,  and  the  society  in  the  bosom 
of  which  they  are  born  and  brought  up,  and  that,  too,  long  be- 
fore they  read  or  are  able  to  read  the  Bible  so  as  to  learn  any 
thing  from  its  sacred  pages  for  themselves.  He  knows,  too,  that, 
when  they  do  come  to  read  the  Bible, — which  may  happen  with 
some  of  them, — they  read  it,  not  to  learn  what  they  are  to  be- 
heve,  not  to  find  what  it  teaches,  but  to  find  in  it  what  they  have 
already  been  taught,  have  imbibed,  or  imagined.  All  Protest- 
ants know  this,  and  it  is  difficult  to  restrain  the  expression  of 
honest  indignation  at  their  hypocrisy  and  cant  about  the  Bible, 
and  taking  their  belief  fi'om  the  Bible, — the  Bible,  the  precious 
word  of  God.  The  most  they  do,  as  a  general  rule,  is  to  go  to 
the  Bible  to  find  in  it  what  they  have  already  found  elsewhere, 
and  it  rarely  happens  that  they  find  any  thing  in  it  except  what 
they  project  into  its  sacred  pages  from  their  own  minds. 

To  hear  Protestants  talk,  one  would  think  they  were  the 
o-reatest  Bible-readers  in  the  world,  and  that  they  believed  every 
thing  in  the  Bible,  and  nothing  except  what  they  learn  from  it. 
It  is  no  such  thing.     Who  among  them  trusts  to  the  Bible  alone  ? 


164  THORNWELLS    ANSWER 

Where  is  the  Protestant  parent,  pretending  to  any  decent  respect 
for  religion,  who  leaves  his  children  lo  grow  up  without  any  re- 
lio-ious  instruction  till  thev  are  able  to  read  and  understand  the 
Bible  for  themselves  ?  Has  not  every  sect  its  catechism  ?  A 
catechism  ?  What  means  this  ?  With  "  the  Bible,  the  whole 
Bible,  and  nothing  but  the  Bible"  on  their  lips,  have  they  the 
audacity  and  the  inconsistency  to  draw  up  a  catechism  and  teach 
it  to  their  children  ?  Why  do  they  not  follow  out  their  princi- 
ple, and  leave  their  children  to  "  the  Bible,  the  whole  Bible,  and 
nothing  but  the  Bible  ? "  Do  you  shrink,  Protestant  parents,  as 
well  you  may,  from  the  fearful  responsibility  of  suffering  your 
children  to  grow  up  without  any  religious  instruction  ?  Why 
not  shrink  also  from  the  still  more  fearful  responsibility  of  teach- 
ing them  your  words  for  the  word  of  God  ?  You  tell  us  the 
Bible  is  your  sol'^.  rule  of  faith,  that  there  are  no  divinely  ap- 
pointed teachers  of  the  word  of  God,  and  you  sneer  at  the  very 
idea  that  Almighty  God  has  provided  for  its  infallible  teaching ; 
and  yet  you,  without  authority,  fallible  by  your  own  confession, 
draw  up  a  catechism,  take  upon  yourselves  the  office  of  religious 
teachei-s,  and  do  not  hesitate  to  teach  your  own  crude  notions, 
your  own  fallible,  and,  it  may  be,  blasphemous  opinions,  training 
up  your  children,  it  may  be,  in  the  synagogue  of  Satan,  keeping 
them  aliens  from  the  communion  of  saints,  and  under  the  eter- 
nal wrath  of  God !  How  is  it  that  you  reflect  not  on  what  you 
are  doing,  and  for  your  children's  sake,  if  not  for  your  own,  you 
do  not  tremble  at  your  madness  and  folly  ?  Who  gave  you 
authority  to  teach  these  dear  children  ?  Who  is  responsible  to 
their  young  minds  and  candid  souls  for  the  truth  of  the  doc- 
trines you  instil  into  them  ?  0  Protestant  fether,  thou  art  mad  ? 
Thou  lovest  thy  child,  art  ready  to  compass  sea  and  land  for  him, 
and  yet,  for  aught  thou  knowest,  thou  art  doing  all  in  thy  power 
to  train  him  to  be  the  eternal  enemy  of  God,  and  to  suffer  for 
ever  the  flames  of  divine  vengeance  ! 

But  the  catechism. — Wlio  gave  to  you  authority  to  draw  up 
a  catechism  ?  Would  you  teach  your  children  damnable  here- 
sies ?     Would   you  poison   their  minds  with  error  and   their 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  165 

hearts  with  hes '?  What  it  is  jou  do  when  you  draw  up  and 
teach  a  catechism  ?  You  deny  the  authority  of  the  Church 
to  teach,  yet  here  you  are,  Episcopalians,  Presbyterians,  Bap- 
tists, Methodists,  Ranters,  Jumpei-s,  Dunkers,  Socinians,  Unita- 
rians, Universahsts,  all  of  you,  doing  what  you  make  it  a  crime 
in  her  to  do, — drawing  up  and  teaching  a  catechism,  the  most 
solemn  and  responsible  act  of  teaching  that  can  be  performed ; 
for  in  it  you  demand  of  confiding  childhood  simple  and  un- 
wavering behef  in  what  you  teach  !  But  the  catechisms,  you 
say,  are  for  the  most  part  drawn  up  in  the  language  of  the 
Holy  Scriptures.  Be  it  so.  Who  gave  you  authority  to  teach 
the  Holy  Scriptures  ?  What  infalhble  assurance  have  you,  that, 
in  teaching  the  words  of  Scripture,  you  are  teaching  the  sense 
of  Scripture  ?  Is  it  a  difficult  thing  either  to  lie  or  to  blaspheme 
in  the  w^ords  of  Scripture  ? 

We  confess  that  we  can  hardly  observe  any  measure  in  our 
feelings  or  in  our  language,  when  we  regard  the  profession  and 
the  practice  of  Protestants,  when  we  consider  how  they  lie  unto 
the  world  and  unto  themselves,  and  how  many  precious  souls, 
for  whom  our  God  has  died,  they  shut  out  fi'om  salvation.  One 
must  speak  in  strong  language,  or  the  very  stones  would  cry  out 
against  him.  The  Professor,  whom  we  have  supposed  going 
with  his  Bible  in  his  hands,  and  holding  it  out  to  the  rude 
savage  or  poor  slave,  ignorant  of  letters,  saying,  "  Read  this,  my 
son,  and  it  shall  make  you  wise  unto  salvation," — would  he 
wait,  think  ye,  till  his  tawny  son  or  black  brother  had  learned 
to  read  and  become  able  to  draw  his  faith  from  the  Bible  for 
himself,  before  instructing  him  ?  Be  assured,  not.  He  would 
hasten  to  instruct  him  without  delay  in  his  Presbyterian  Cate- 
chism, the  Westminster  Confession  of  Faith,  the  Five  Points  of 
the  Synod  of  Dort,  or  some  modification  of  them.  Never  would 
he  trust  him  to  the  Bible  alone.  So  it  is  with  all  Protestant 
missionaries,  and  so  must  it  be.  No  matter  what  they  profess, 
in  practice  none  of  the  sects  place  or  can  place  their  dependence 
on  the  written  word  to  teach  the  faith  without  the  aid  of  the 
living  preacher.     They  all  know,  or  might  know,  that  they  use 


166  thornwell's  answer 

the  Bible,  not  as  the  source  from  which  the  simple  believer  is 
to  draw  his  faith,  but  as  a  shield  to  protect  the  teachers  of  one 
sect  from  those  of  aiiother  ;  and  tliat  they  assert  its  authority 
only  as  enabling  each  preacher  to  find  some  plausible  pretext  for 
preaching  whatever  comes  into  his  own  head.  They  place  their 
dependence,  not  on  a  dead  book,  which  when  interrogated  can 
answer  never  a  word,  which  lies  at  the  mercy  of  every  interpreter, 
but,  nolens  volens,  on  the  living  teacher,  gnd  do  without  author- 
ity, and  against  their  avowed  principles,  what  they  condemn  us 
for  doing,  and  what  we  do  at  least  consistently,  and  in  obedience 
to  our  principles. 

There  is  no  use  in  multiplying  words  or  making  wry  faces 
about  the  matter.  Whatever  men  may  pretend,  'f  they  have 
any  form  of  belief  or  of  unbelief,  their  reliance  is  on  the  living 
teacher  to  preserve  and  promulgate  it.  The  thing  is  inevitable. 
And  since  it  is  so,  it  is  absolutely  necessary,  if  we  are  to  know 
and  believe  the  word  of  God,  that  we  have  teachers  duly  author- 
ized, divinely  appointed  to  teach  that  word,  so  that  we  may  not 
believe  for  the  word  of  God  the  words  of  fallible  men  or  of 
devils.  Therefore,  even  if  we  could  establish  the  inspiration  of 
the  Scriptures,  as  we  cannot  without  the  Church,  the  Church 
would  still  be  indispensable,  for  without  her  we  should  still  have 
no  infallible  means  of  knowing  what  is  the  word  of  God. 

We  have  here  refuted  the  Professor's  thesis  in  all  its  parts. 
We  have  shown  him  that  he  has  no  logical  right  to  urge  it ; 
that  if  he  is  allowed  to  urge  it,  he  cannot  prove  it,  but  that  we 
can  easily  prove  the  contrary  ;  and,  finally,  that  if  he  could 
prove  it,  it  would  avail  him  nothing.  We  hope  this  will  be 
satisfactory  to  him  and  his  friends.  He  has  been,  even  his 
friends  must  confess,  singularly  unsuccessful ;  but  the  fault  has 
not  been  altogether  his  own.  lie  has  done  as  well  as  any  Prot- 
estant could  do.  But  it  is  an  old  and  expressive  proverb,  if  a 
homely  one,  that  "  nobody  can  make  a  silk  purse  out  of  a  sow's 
ear."  Nobody  can  make  any  thing  out  of  Protestantism,  and 
her  defence  must  needs  baffle  the  finest  intellects.  She  is  utterly 
indefensible.    No  man  can  construct  an  argument  in  her  Cuvor,  or 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  167 

against  the  Clmrch,  that  is  not  at  bottom  a  mere  fallacy.  Logic 
as  well  as  salvation  is  on  the  side  of  the  Church,  not  with  her 
enemies,  and  Protestantism  is  as  repugnant  to  sound  reason  as 
she  is  to  the  best  interests  of  man.  Whoever  espouses  her  must 
needs  render  himself  an  object  of  pity  to  all  good  men  and  good 
angels.  Mr.  Thornwell  has  naturally  respectable  abilities,  even 
considerable  logical  powers,  and  some  vigor  of  intellect.  He 
wants  refinement,  grace,  unction,  but  he  has  a  sort  of  savage 
earnestness  which  we  do  not  wholly  dislike,  and  manifests  a  zeal 
and  energy,  which,  if  directed  according  to  knowledge,  would 
be  truly  commendable.  But  all  these  quahties  can  avail  him 
nothing,  for  Protestantism  at  best  is  only  a  bundle  of  contra- 
dictions, absurdities,  and  puerilities.  How  a  man  of  an  ordinary 
stomach  could  undertake  its  defence  would  be  to  us  unaccount- 
able, did  we  not  know  to  what  mortifications  and  humiliations 
pride  compels  its  subjects  to  submit.  Pride  cast  the  angels, 
which  kept  not  their  first  estate,  down  from  heaven  to  hell,  and 
perhaps  we  ought  not  to  be  surprised  that  it  degrades  mortal 
men  to  the  ignoble  task  of  writing  in  defence  of  Protestantism. 
The  refutation  of  the  Professor's  thesis  gives  us  the  full  right 
to  conclude  the  infallibility  of  the  Church  with  Dr.  Lynch  from 
the  necessity  of  the  case,  and  therefore  to  assert  it,  whatever 
objections  men  may  fancy  against  it ;  because  the  argument  for 
it  rests  on  as  high  authority  as  it  is  possible  in  the  nature  of 
things  to  have  for  any  objection  against  it.  Nevertheless,  we 
will  examine  in  our  next  Review  the  Professor's  moral  and  his- 
torical objections  to  the  Church,  and  dispose  of  them  as  well  as 
we  can, — we  hope  to  his  satisfaction. 


168 


THORNWELL'S   ANSWER   TO   DR.   LYNCH  * 


In  the  articles  already  devoted  to  Mr.  Thornwell's  book,  we 
have  vindicated  Dr.  Lynch's  argument  drawn  from  the  necessity 
of  the  case  for  the  infallibihty  of  the  Church,  and  proved,  un- 
answerably, if  any  thing  can  be  so  proved,  that  without  the 
infallible  Church,  the  Protestant  is  utterly  unable  to  prove  the 
inspiration  of  the  Scriptures.  Since  he  concedes,  that,  if  the  in- 
fallible Church  exists  at  all,  it  is  the  Catholic  Church,  Mr.  Thorn- 
well  must  then,  either  acknowledge  its  infallibility,  or  give  up 
the  Christian  religion  itself  Having  done  this,  which  has  been 
wholly  gratuitous  on  our  part,  w^e  proceed  to  the  consideration 
of  the  Professor's  direct  arguments  for  the  fallibility  of  the 
Church,  or  his  direct  attempts  to  prove  that  she  is  not  infallible. 

We  have  shown  in  our  tii'st  essay,  that  the  nature  of  the 
argument  the  Professor  is  conducting  does  not  permit  him,  even 
in  case  we  should  fail  to  prove  the  infallibihty,  to  conclude  the 
falhbility  of  the  Church.  He  denies  that  she  h  inflillible,  that 
is,  asserts  that  she  is  fallible,  and  it  is  only  by  proving  her  fallible 
that  he  can  maintain  his  thesis,  that  the  books  which  he  calls 
apocryphal  are  "  corrupt  additions  to  the  word  of  God."  The 
question  is  not  now  on  admitting,  but  on  rejecting,  the  infalli- 
bility of  the  Church,  and  the  onus  probandi.,  as  a  matter  of 
course,  rests  on  him.  He  is  the  plaintiff  in  action,  and  must 
make  out  his  case  by  proving  the  guilt,  not  by  any  failure  on  our 
own  part,  if  fail  we  do,  to  prove  the  innocence,  of  the  accused ; 
for  every  one  is  to  be  presumed  innocent  till  proved  guilty. 

*  The  Apocryphal  Books  of  the  Old  Testament  proved  to  be  Corrupt 
Additions  to  the  Word  of  God. — The  Arguments  of  Romanists  from 
the  Infallibility  of  the  Church  and  the  Testimony  of  the  Fathers  in 
Behalf  of  the  Apocrypha  discussed  and  refuted.  By  James  H. 
Thornwell,.  New  YorK :  Leavitt,  Trow,  &  Co.  Boston ;  Charles 
Tappan.     1845.     16mo.     pp.  417. 


TO    DR,    LYNCH.  169 

"We  have  also  shown,  that  in  attempting-  to  prove  the  falh 
bihty  of  the  Church,  Mr.  Thornwell  must  confine  himself  to  such 
arguments  as  an  infidel  may  consistently  urge.  We  have  already 
disloged  him  from  every  position  he  might  be  disposed  to  occupy 
on  Christian  ground.  He  has  no  magazine  from  which  he  can 
draw  proofs  against  the  Church,  but  the  reason  common  to  all 
men.  He  can  prove  the  Church  fallible  only  by  proving  that 
she  has  actually  erred ;  and  he  can  prove  that  she  has  actually 
erred  only  by  proving  that  she  has  actually  contradicted  some 
principle  of  reason.  It  will  avail  him  nothing  to  prove  by  rea- 
son that  she  teaches  things  the  truth  of  which  reason  cannot 
affirm ;  for  reason  does  not  know  all  things,  and  things  may  be 
above  reason,  and  yet  not  against  reason.  Nor  will  it  avail  him 
to  prove  that  she  contradicts  his  private  convictions,  or  the  teach- 
ings of  his  sect ;  for  neither  he  nor  his  sect  is  infallible.  Noth- 
ing will  avail  him  but  to  prove  some  instance  of  her  contradiction 
of  a  truth  of  reason,  infallibly  known  to  be  such  truth.  The 
sim[)le  question  for  us  to  determine,  then,  in  regard  to  what  he 
alleges,  is.  Has  he  adduced  an  instance  of  such  contradiction  ? 
If  he  has,  he  has  succeeded ;  if  he  has  not,  he  has  failed,  and 
we,  since  the  presumption,  as  we  say  in  law,  is  in  our  favor, 
may  conclude  the  infallibility  of  the  Church  against  him. 

1.  Mr.  Thorn  well's  first  alleged  proof  that  the  Church  is  not 
infallible  is,  that  Catholics  differ  among  themselves  as  to  the  seat 
of  infallibility.  It  is  uncertain  where  the  infallibility  is  lodged. 
Then  it  is  not  apparent ;  and  if  not  apparent,  it  does  not  exist ; 
for  de  non  apparentibus  et  non  existentibus  eadem  est  ratio.  But 
this,  supposing  it  to  be  true,  though  a  good  reason  why  we  can- 
not assert  the  infallibility  as  a  fact  proved,  is  not  a  good  reason 
for  asserting  that,  it  does  not  exist.  A  thing  may  exist  and  yet 
not  appear  to  us.  Otherwise  the  stai-s  would  not  exist  when  the  sun 
shines,  nor  gems  in  the  mine  before  being  discovered.  The  point 
to  be  established  is  not  the  non-appearance  of  the  infallibility, 
but  its  non-existence  ;  and  if  the  Professor  does  not  show  that 
non-existence,  he  fails,  for  his  own  maxim  then  bears  against 
him, — de  non  apparentibus  et  non  existentibus  eadem  est  ratio. 
8 


lYO  thornwell's  answer 

But  what  is  alleged  is  not  true.  Catholics  do  not  disagree  as 
to  the  seat  of  infallibility.  Mr.  Thornwell  is  mistaken,  when  he 
says  (p.  76), — "  There  are  no  less  than  three  different  opinions 
entertained  in  your  Church  as  to  the  organ  through  which  its 
infallibility  is  exercised  or  manifested."  He  confounds  the  three 
different  modes  in  which  Catholics  hold  that  the  infalhbihty  is 
exercised  with  three  different  opinions  as  to  its  organ,  evidently 
supposing  that  they  who  assert  one  of  them  must  needs  deny 
the  other  two.  All  Catholics  agree,  and  must  agree,  for  it  is  dt 
Jide^  that  the  pastors  of  the  Church,  that  is,  the  bishops  in  union 
with  the  Pope,  their  visible  head,  are  infallible  in  what  they 
teach,  both  when  congregated  in  general  council  and  when  dis- 
persed, each  bishop  in  his  own  diocese  ;  and  the  great  majority 
hold  that  the  Pope  alone,  when  deciding  a  question  of  faith  or 
morals  for  the  whole  Church,  is  also  infallible.  The  only  differ- 
ence of  opinion  amongst  us  is  as  to  the  fact,  whether  the  Pope 
is  or  is  not  infallible,  when  so  deciding.  But  as  there  is  no  dif- 
ference of  opinion  as  to  the  other  two  modes,  whatever  difference 
there  may  be  as  to  this,  it  is  not  true  that  there  are  "  three 
different  opinions  in  our  Church  as  to  the  organ  through  which 
its  infallibility  is  exercised  or  manifested." 

2.  The  Church  cannot  be  infallible,  because  she  requires  a 
slavish  submission  of  all  her  members,  bishops,  priests,  and  laity, 
to  the  Pope.  "The  system  of  absolute  submission  runs  un- 
checked until  it  terminates  in  the  Sovereign  Pontiff  at  Rome, 
whose  edicts  and  decrees  none  can  question,  and  who  is  therefore 
absi^lute  lord  of  the  Papal  faith,"  (p.  7 7.)  "VYe  can  see  nothing 
unreasonable  in  making  the  Pope,  under  God,  the  "  absolute 
lord  of  the  PajJal  faith."  As  to  the  submission,  if  the  Pope 
has  authority  from  God  as  the  supreme  visible  head  of  the 
Church,  it  cannot  be  a  slavish  submission  ;  for  slavery  is  not 
in  submission,  but  in  submission  to  an  authority  which  has  no 
right  to  exact  it.  Reason  teaches  that  we  are  bound  to  obey 
God,  and  to  obey  him  equally  through  whatever  organ  it  may 
please  him  to  command  us,  or  to  promulgate  his  will.  If  he  lias 
commissioned  the  Pope  as  his  vicar  in  the  government  of  the 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  1*71 

Church,  there  is  nothing  rejmgnant  to  reason  in  submission  or 
obedience  to  the  Pope.  The  Professor  must  prove  that  the  Pope 
is  not  divinely  commissioned,  before,  from  the  fact  that  the 
Church  obHges  us  to  obey  him,  he  can  conclude  that  she  errs  or 
is  liable  to  err.     But  this  he  has  not  proved. 

3.  The  Church  makes  the  Pope  greater  than  God, — II  jpapa 
e  piu  che  Dio  per  noi  altri. — and  cannot  assert  his  supremacy 
without  asserting  his  infallibihty.  But  if  she  asserts  the  infalli- 
bility of  the  Pope,  she  denies  that  she  is  an  infallible  Church  ; 
for,  during  the  first  six  centuries,  there  was  no  Pope.  j(p.  V8.) 
Where  the  Professor  picked  up  his  scrap  of  Italian,  he  does  not 
inform  us ;  but  if  any  one  has  made  him  believe  that  Catholics 
hold  the  Pope  to  be  greater  than  God,  he  may  be  sure  he  has 
been  imposed  upon.  How  can  we  hold  the  Pope  to  be  greater 
than  God,  when  we  believe  him  to  be  simply  the  vicar  of  Jesus 
Christ,  recei\ing  all  that  he  is  and  has  from  God  ?  Grant  that 
Papal  supremacy  necessarily  carries  with  it  Papal  infallibility, — 
a  doctrine  we  by  no  means  dispute, — the  conclusion  is  not  sus- 
tained ;  for  it  is  not  proved  that  during  the  first  six  centuries 
there  was  no  Pope.  What  the  Professor  alleges  as  proof  is  not 
conclusive.  His  statements  are  either  false  or  irrelevant.  What 
he  says  that  is  true  is  not  to  his  purpose ;  what  he  says  that  is 
to  his  purpose  is  not  true.  He  alleges, — 1.  Till  the  seventh 
century,  at  least,  the  bishops  of  the  Church,  not  excepting  the 
bishops  of  Rome,  were  regarded  as  officially  equal ;  2.  Accord- 
ing to  St.  Jerome,  w-herever  there  is  a  bishop,  he  is  of  the  same 
merit  and  the  same  priesthood,  and,  according  to  St.  Cyprian, 
the  episcopate  is  one,  and  every  bishop  has  an  undivided  portion 
of  it ;  3.  St.  Cyprian  says  to  the  African  bishops  in  the  great 
council  at  Carthage,  that  none  of  them  makes  himself  a  bishop 
of  bishops,  and  that  it  belongs  solely  to  our  Lord  Jesus  Christ  to 
invest  them  with  authority  in  the  government  of  his  Church,  and 
to  judge  them ;  and,  4.  St.  Gregory  the  Great  disclaimed  the 
title  of  "Universal  Bishop."  (pp.  78,  79.) 

To  the  first  we  reply,  that,  not  only  as  late  as  the  seventh 
century  were  all  the  bishops  of  the  Church,  not  excepting  the 


172  thornwell's  answer 

bishops  of  Rome,  regarded  as  officially  equal,  but  they  are,  as 
bishops,  so  regarded  even  now ;  and  as  the  fact  that  they  are 
now  so  regarded  does  not  prove  that  there  is  now  no  Pope,  the 
fact  that  they  were  so  regarded  during  the  first  six  centuries  can- 
not prove  that  there  was  no  Pope  then.  The  equality  of  all 
bishops  is  a  doctrine  of  the  Church.  The  Pope,  as  simple 
bishop,  is  only  the  equal  of  his  brethren ;  he  is  superior  only  as 
bishop  of  Rome,  of  which  see  the  primacy  is  an  adjunct,  or  pre- 
rogative. "Thus,  a  Roman  council,  in  378,  says  of  Pope  Dam- 
asus,  that  he  is  equal  in  office  to  the  other  bishops,  and  surpasses 
them  in  the  prerogative  of  his  see."* 

To  the  second  we  give  a  similar  reply.  The  unity  of  the 
episcopate,  and  that  each  bishop  possesses  an  undivided  por- 
tion of  it,  that  is,  that  the  bishops  possess  or  hold  it  in  solido, 
according  to  the  fclicitious  expression  of  St.  Cyprian,  is  held  by 
the  Church  now,  and  believed  as  firmly  by  all  Catholics  as  ever 
it  was.  As  the  belief  of  this  doctrine  is  not  now  disconnected 
with  the  belief  in  the  Papacy,  it  cannot  follow,  from  its  having 
been  entertained  in  the  time  of  St.  Cyprian,  that  there  was  then 
no  Pope.  This  reply  disposes  of  the  citation  from  St.  Jerome, 
as  well  as  of  that  from  St.  Cyprian.  But  the  Professor  argues, 
that,  if  the  episcopate  be  one,  and  the  bishops  possess  it  in  soli- 
do,  there  can  be  no  Pope.  We  do  not  see  that  this  follows. 
Unity  is  inconceivable  without  a  centre  of  unity,  and  how  con- 
ceive the  bishops  united  in  one  and  the  same  episcopate  without 
the  Pope  as  their  centre  of  union  ? 

To  the  third  we  reply,  that,  according  to  the  fair  interpretation 
of  the  language  of  St.  Cyprian,  in  reference  to  its  occasion  and 
purpose,  it  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  subject.  But  let  it  be 
that  St.  Cyprian  intended  to  deny,  and  actually  does  deny,  the 
Papal  authority,  what  then  ?  Before  the  Professor  can  conclude 
that  there  was  no  Pope  down  to  St.  Cyprian's  time,  he  must 
prove  either  that  St.  Cyprian  is  a  witness  whose  testimony  we 
as  Catholics,  are  bound  to  receive,  or  that  he  is  one  who  could 

*  Ep.  V.  Apud  Constant,  T.  I.  col.  528,  cited  by  Kenrick,  Primacy 
of  the  Apostolic  See,  p.  106,  3d  edition. 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  l73 

not  err.  As  Catliolics,  we  are  bound  to  receive  the  testimony 
of  single  fathers  or  doctors  only  so  far  as  their  teaching  is  coin- 
cident with  that  of  the  Church.  The  infallibility  attaches  to  the 
Church,  and  to  single  doctors  only  in  so  far  as  they  teach  her 
doctrine.  ISTever,  then,  can  we  be  bound  to  receive  the  testimo- 
ny of  any  father  or  doctor  which  conflicts  with  her  teachings 
The  Testimony  of  St.  Cyprian  does  thus  conflict,  if  what  it  is 
alleged  to  be.  Therefore  we  are  not  bound  to  receive  it,  and  it 
cannot  be  urged  against  us,  as  an  argumentum  ad  homineni. 
Then  the  Professor  must  prove  that  St.  Cyprian  did  not  err. 
But,  from  the  nature  of  the  case,  this  he  can  do  only  by  prov- 
ing that  he  could  not  err.  This  he  does  not  do,  and  cannot  pre- 
tend ;  for  he  admits  no  infallible  authority  but  that  of  the  writ- 
ten word.  (p.  84.)  Consequently,  let  the  testimony  of  St.  Cy- 
prian be  what  it  may,  it  is  not  sufficient  to  prove  that  there  was 
no  Pope  down  to  his  time. 

Moreover,  if  the  alleged  testimony  of  St.  Cyprian  refers  to 
the  Papal  authority  at  all,  it  refers  to  it  only  inasmuch  as  it  de- 
nies the  right  of  St.  Stephen,  his  contemporary,  whom  Mr. 
Thornwell  himself  calls  the  Pope,  to  excercise  that  authority. 
If  St.  Cyprian's  language  does  not  express  resistance  to  the  Pa- 
pal authority,  it  contains  no  reference  to  it.  But  resistance  to 
an  authority  proves  its  existence.  There  was,  then,  in  the  time 
of  St.  Cyprian,  an  actual  Pope,  that  is,  a  Pope  claiming  the  right 
to  exercise  the  Papal  authority ;  and  the  position  of  the  Profes- 
sor, that  there  was  no  Pope,  is  contradicted  by  his  own  witness. 
"  But  not  according  to  the  constitution  of  the  Church."  That 
is  a  question,  not  of  reason,  but  of  authority,  and  therefore  not 
debatable.  The  simple  question,  stated  in  the  terms  most  favor- 
able to  the  Professor,  resolves  itself  into  this, — whether  St.  Cyp- 
rian is  to  be  believed  against  St.  Stephen,  who  claimed  to  be 
Pope,  and  the  Church,  who  admitted  his  claim.  To  assume 
that  he  is,  is  to  beg  the  question.  The  Professor  must,  then, 
give  us  a  valid  reason  for  believing  St.  Cyprian  rather  than  St. 
Stephen  and  the  Church,  or  he  proves  nothing  by  St.  Cyprian's 
testimony,  be  it  what  it  may.     But  he  has  given  us  no  such 


174  thornwell's  answer, 

reason.  St.  Cyprian  was  fallible,  and  fallibility  is  not  sufficient 
to  set  aside  the  claim  of  infallibility. 

To  the  fourth  we  answer,  that  St.  Gregory  the  Great  disclaimed 
through  humihty,  as  savoring  of  pride,  the  title  of  "  Universal 
T3i.shop,"  we  grant,  but  this  is  nothing  to  the  purpose.  The 
Professor  must  prove  that  he  disclaimed  the  Papacy  and  the 
Papal  authority,  or  he  does  not  prove  his  position.  But  this  he 
does  not  and  cannot  do ;  for  St.  Gregory  the  Great,  as  is  well 
l^novvn,  on  numerous  occasions,  asserted  and  exercised  that  au- 
thority ;  nay,  it  was  in  the  exercise  of  it  that  he  rebuked 
John  Jpjunator,  Patriarch  of  Constantinople,  for  arrogating  to 
himself  the  title  of  "  (Ecumenical  Patriarch,"  a  title  which 
even  the  Bishop  of  Rome,  though  Sovereign  Pontiff,  forbore  to 
assume. 

The  Professor,  it  is  evident  from  these  replies,  Ms  to  prove 
that  during  the  first  six  centuries  there  was  no  Pope.  His  ob- 
jection, founded  on  the  assum|)tion  that  there  was  none,  falls, 
therefore,  to  the  ground  ;  and  if  it  were  required  by  our  present 
argument,  we  could  and  would,  prove  an  uninterrupted  succes- 
sion of  Popes  from  St.  Peter  to  Pius  the  Ninth. 

4.  The  Professor,  taking  it  for  granted  that  he  had  proved 
that  the  infallibility  of  the  Church,  if  lodged  with  the  Pope, 
could  not  be  asserted,  proceeds  to  show  that  it  cannot  be  main- 
tained, if  lodged  either  with  general  councils  or  with  the  Eccle 
sia  dispersa.  But  these  three  ways  are  all  the  possible  suppo- 
sitions, and  if  in  no  one  of  these  the  Church  can  be  infalhble, 
she  cannot  be  infallible  at  all.  But  he  has  not,  as  we  have 
seen,  disproved  her  infallibility  through  the  Pope,  and,  for  aught 
he  proves,  she  may  be  infallible  through  her  Sovereign  Pontiffs. 
Consequently;  as  far  as  the  argument  to  disprove  her  infallibility 
is  concerned,  it  is  no  matter  whether  she  is  infallible  in  either 
of  the  other  two  modes  or  not. 

But  she  cannot  be  infallible,  if  the  infallibility  be  lodged  with 
the  general  councils ;  for  full  two  hundred  years  elapsed  from 
the  death  of  the  hist  of  the  Apostles  before  such  a  council  was 
assen^bled.  (p.  79.)     If  her  infalhbility  is  expressed  onhj  through 


TO    DR.    LYNCH. 


175 


general  councils,  we  concede  it;  but  this  is  no  Catholic  doc- 
trine ;  for  we  all,  while  we  hold  the  general  councils  to  be  infal- 
lible, hold  also  that  the  bishops  of  the  Church  in  union  with 
their  chief,  the  Pope,  teach  infallibly  when  dispersed,  each  in  hia 
own  diocese,  as  well  as  when  congregated  in  council. 

But  the  councils  cannot  be  infallible,  because  the  early  coun- 
cils attributed  the .  authority  of  the  canons  they  settled  to  the 
sanction  of  the  Emperor,  (p.  80.)  As  this  is  asserted  without 
any  proof,  it  is  sufficient  for  us .  simply  to  deny  it.  That  the 
civil  effect  of  the  canons,  or  their  authority  as  civil  laws,  de- 
pended on  the  sanction  of  the  Emperor,  we  concede,— for  the 
Chui-ch  never  assumes  to  enact  civil  laws;  but  that  tliey  de- 
pended on  that  sanction  for  their  spiritual  effect,  or  their  author- 
ity in  the  spiritual  order,  we  deny,  and  some  better  authority 
tl'ian  that  of  one  Barrow,  an  Anglican  minister,  which  is  no  au- 
thority at  all,  will  be  needed  to  prove  it. 

The  infallibility  of  the  Church,  continues  the  Professor,  can- 
not be  maintained,  if  lodged  with  the  pastors  of  the  Church 
dispersed  each  in  his  own  diocese ;  because  it  would  then  depend 
on  unanimous  consent,  and  the  unanimous  consent  of  all  can 
never  be  ascertained,  (p.  81.)  This  unanimous  consent  could 
not  be  ascertained,  if  the  pastors  of  the  Church  were  so  many 
independent  and  unrelated  individuals,  hke  Protestant  ministei-s, 
we  concede ;  but,  whether  congregated  or  dispersed,  Catholic 
pa-stors  are  one  body,  hold  the  episcopate  m  solido,  and 
through  the  Pope,  the  centre  of  unity  and  communion,  they  all 
comnnme  with  each,  and  each  with  all.  Each  is  bound  for  all, 
and  all  for  each,  and  each  by  virtue  of  this  communion  can  give 
the  unanimous  faith  of  all.  All  that  we  need  know  is  that  the 
particular  pastor  to  whom  we  are  subjected  is  in  communion 
with  the  Pope ;  for  if  he  is,  we  know  he  is  in  communion  with 
the  head,  then  with  the  body,  and  then  with  the  members.  If 
thus  in  communion  with  the  head,  with  the  body,  and  with  the 
members,  what  he  gives  as  the  unanimous  faith  of  the  whole 
must  be  the  unanimous  faith  of  the  whole,  or  that  which  has  the 
unanimous  consent  of  all. 


176 

5.  But  the  Churcli  cannot  be  infallible,  because  she  has  con- 
tradicted herself.  "  Popes  have  contradicted  Popes,  councils 
have  contradicted  councils,  pastors  have  contradicted  pastors, 
&c."  (p.  83.)  This  argument  is  good,  if  the  fact  be  as  alleged. 
But  the  fact  of  contradiction  must  be  proved,  not  taken  for 
granted.  Does  the  Professor  prove  it  ?  Let  us  see.  The  first 
proof  he  offers  is,  that  "  the  Council  of  Constantinople  decreed 
the  removal  of  images,  and  the  abolition  of  image-worship,  and 
the  Council  of  Nice,  twenty-three  years  after,  re-established 
both."  (p.  84.)  But,  unhappily  for  the  Professor,  no  Council 
of  Constantinople,  or  of  any  other  place,  recognized  or  received 
by  the  Church  as  a  council,  ever  decreed  any  such  thing.  There 
may  have  been,  for  aught  we  care,  an  assembly  of  Iconoclasts 
at  Constantinople,  collected  by  an  IconocL'istic  emperor,  which 
made  some  such  decree  ;  but  that  no  more  implicates  the  Church 
than  a  decree  of  a  college  of  dervishes  or  of  a  synod  of  Presby- 
terian minister's. 

"  The  second  Council  of  Ephesus  appi'oved  and  sanctioned  the 
impiety  of  Eutyches,  and  the  Council  of  Chalcedon  condemned 
it."  (ib.)  But  there  was  only  one  Council  of  Ephesus,  and  that 
was  held  before  the  I'ise  of  the  Eutychian  heresy  1  There  was 
an  Ephesian  Latrocinium  which  approved  the  heresy  of  Euty- 
ches, but  it  was  no  council,  and  its  doings  were  condemned, 
instantly,  by  the  Church. 

"The  fourth  Council  of  Lateran  asserted  the  doctrine  of  a 
physical  change  in  the  Eucharistic  elements,  in  express  contra- 
diction to  the  teachings  of  the  primitive  Church,  and  the  evi- 
dent declarations  of  the  Apostles  of  the  Lord."  (ib.)  The  Pro- 
fessor is  not  the  authority  for  determining  what  was  the  doctrine 
of  the  Apostles  or  of  the  primitive  Church,  and  cannot  urge  his 
notions  of  either  as  a  standard  by  which  to  try  the  Church.  He 
must  adduce,  on  the  authoiity  of  the  Church  herself,  the  teach- 
ings of  the  primitive  Church  contradicted  by  the  decree  of  the 
fourth  Council  of  Lateran,  before  he  can  allege  that  decree  or 
assertion  as  a  proof  of  her  having  contradicted  herself.  This 
he  has  not  done. 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  17*7 

"  The  second  Council  of  Orange  gave  its  sanction  to  some  of 
the  leading*  doctrines  of  the  school  of  Augustine,  and  the  Coun- 
cil of  Ti-ent  threw  the  Church  into  the  arms  of  Pelagius."  (ib.) 
Here  no  instance  of  contradiction  is  expressed.  But  it  is  not 
true,  and  the  Professor  offers  no  proof,  that  the  Council  of  Trent 
threw  the  Church  into  the  arms  of  Pelagius ;  and  as  a  matter 
of  fact,  that  council  defines  the  doctrines  of  grace,  which  con- 
demn the  Pelagian  heresy,  in  the  very  words  of  St.  Augustine. 
The  Professor  would  do  well  to  set  about  the  study  of  ecclesias- 
tical history 

"  Thus,  at  different  periods,  every  type  of  doctrine  has  pre- 
vailed in  the  bosom  of  an  unchangeable  Church."  {ib.)  Not 
proved,  and  would  not  be,  even  if  the  foregoing  charges  were 
sustained.  False  inferences  and  unsupported  assertions  are  not 
precisely  the  arguments  to  disprove  the  infallibility  of  the  Church. 
We  beg  the  Professor  to  review  his  logic. 

"  The  Church  has  been  distracted  by  every  variety  of  sect, 
tormented  by  every  kind  of  controversy,  convulsed  by  every 
species  of  heresy."  If  this  means  that  she  has  sanctioned  every 
variety  of  sect  and  every  species  of  heresy,  we  simply  reply,  that 
the  Professor  has  not  proved  it ;  if  it  means,  that,  first  and  last, 
she  has  had  to  combat  every  variety  of  sect  and  species  of  heresy, 
we  concede  it.  But  to  adduce  this  as  a  proof  of  her  having  con- 
tradicted herself  is  ridiculous  in  logic,  and  monstrous  in  morals. 
You  might  as  well  argue  that  the  Church  was  once  Lutheran, 
because  she  condemned  Lutheranism,  Calvinistic,  because  she 
condemned  Calvinism,  that  St.  John  was  a  Gnostic,  because  he 
wrote  his  Gospel  to  condemn  Gnosticism,  or  that  Mr.  Thornwell 
himself  is  a  Cathohc,  because  he  anathematizes  Catholicity  ;  nay, 
that  the  judge,  who,  in  the  discharge  of  his  judicial  functions, 
condemns  the  crime  of  murder,  must  needs  be  the  murderer, 
and  that  the  eleven  were  guilty  of  the  treacher}^  of  Judas,  for 
they  no  doubt  condemned  it.  Is  this  Protestant  logic,  and 
Protestant  moi-ality  ? 

The  Church  "  at  last  has  settled  down  on  a  platform  which 
annihilates  the  word  of  God,  denounces  the  doctrines  of  Christ 


178  thornwell's  answer 

and  his  Apostles,  and  bars  the  gates  of  salvation  against  men." 
(ib.)     Indeed  !     How  did  the  Professor  learn  all  that  ? 

Here  is  all  the  Professor  adduces  to  prove  the  fact  of  the 
Church  liaving  contradicted  herself,  and  it  evidently  does  not 
prove  it.  Then  the  argument  founded  on  it  against  the  infalli- 
bility of  the  Church  must  go  for  nothing.  For  aught  that  yet 
appears,  the  Church  may  be  infallible.  It  is  certainly  a  great 
inconvenience  not  to  know  ecclesiastical  history  when  one  wishes 
to  reason  from  it. 

From  these  objections,  which  the  Professor  calls  "historical 
difficulties  in  the  doctrine  of  Papal  infallibility,"  we  proceed  to 
consider  another  class,  in  his  Sixth  Letter,  which  we  may  term 
philosophical  difficulties.  The  charge  imder  this  head  is,  that 
the  doctrine  of  the  infallibility  of  the  Church — Papal  infellibility, 
as  the  Professor  improperly  expresses  it — leads  to  skepticism, 
(p.  89.)  The  proofs  assigned,  as  nearly  as  we  can  get  at  them, 
amidst  a  mass  of  speculations  sometimes  correct  enough,  but 
illustrating,  when  considered  in  relation  to  the  argument,  only 
the  ignorantia  elenchi, — a  favorite  figure  of  logic  with  the 
authoi-, — are  two,  namely,  the  Church  enjoins  dogmas  which 
contradict  reason,  and  holds  that  doctrines  may  be  philosophi- 
cally true,  and  yet  theologically  false. 

1.  The  instance  adduced  to  prove  that  the  Church  requires  us 
to  believe  what  contradicts  reason  is  the  doctrine  of  Transub- 
stantiation.  It  is  a  principle  of  reason  that  we  believe  our  senses. 
But  this  doctrine  denies  the  testimony  of  our  senses,  and  there- 
fore contradicts  reason.  "  Upon  the  authority  of  Rome  we  are 
required  to  believe  that  what  our  senses  pronounce  to  be  bread, 
that  what  the  minutest  analysis  which  chemistry  can  institute  is 
able  to  resolve  into  nothing  but  bread,  what  every  sense  pro- 
nounces to  be  material,  is  yet  the  Incarnate  Son  of  God,  soul, 
and  body,  and  Divinity,  full  and  entire,  perfect  and  complete. 
Here  Rome  and  the  senses  are  e^^dently  at  war ;  and  here  the 
infallible  Church  is  made  to  despise  one  of  the  original  principles 
of  belief  which  God  has  impressed  upon  the  constitution  of  the 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  Il9 

mind."  (p.  93.)  What  is  here  said  about  the  minutest  analysis 
chemistry  can  institute,  &c.,  amounts  to  nothing,  makes  the  case 
neither  stronger  nor  weaker ;  for  chemical  analysis,  however 
minute  or  successful,  can  give  us  only  sensible  phenomena.  It 
never  attains  to  substance  itself.  The  simple  assertion  is,  that 
the  doctrine  of  Transubstantiation  contradicts  reason,  because  it 
contradicts  the  senses.     But  is  this  true  ? 

There  is  no  contradiction  of  the  senses,  unless  the  doctrine 
requires  us  to  believe  that  what  is  attested  by  the  senses  is  false. 
What  is  it  the  senses  attest  ?  Simply  the  presence  in  the  Sacred 
Host  of  the  species,  accidents,  or  sensible  phenomena  of  bread. 
This  is  all ;  for  it  is  well  settled  in  philosophy,  that  the  senses 
attain  only  to  the  phenomena,  and  never  to  the  substance  or  sub- 
ject of  the  phenomena.  Does  the  doctrine  of  Transubstantiation 
deny  this  ?  Not  at  all.  It  asserts  precisely  what  the  senses 
assert,  namely,  the  presence  in  the  Sacred  Host  of  the  species, 
accidents,  or  sensible  phenomena  of  bread.  Then  it  does  not 
contradict  the  senses. 

"  But  it  is  a  principle  of  human  nature  to  believe,  that,  where 
we  find  the  phenomena,  there  is  also  their  subject ;  that,  if  in  the 
Sacred  Host  all  the  sensible  phenomena  of  bread  are  present, 
the  substance  of  bread  is  also  present."  Undoubtedly,  if  rea- 
son has  no  authority,  satisfactory  to  herself,  for  believing  the 
contrary.  In  ordinary  cases,  reason  has  no  such  authority,  and 
we  are  to  believe  that  the  sensible  phenomena  and  their  subject 
do  go  together.  But  reason  cannot  deny  that  God,  if  he  chooses, 
can,  by  a  miraculous  exertion  of  his  power,  change  the  subject 
without  changing  the  phenomena,  and  if  in  any  particular  case 
it  be  certified  infallibly  to  her  that  he  actually  does  so,  she  her- 
self requires  us  to  believe  it.  In  the  Most  Holy  Eucharist,  it  is 
so  certified  to  reason,  if  the  Church  be  infallible,  and  therefore, 
in  believing  that  the  sensible  phenomena  of  bread  are  there 
without  their  natural  subject,  we  are  simply  obeying  reason,  and 
of  course,  then,  do  not  contradict  it.  It  is  no  contradiction  of 
reason  to  believe  on  a  higher  reason  what  we  should  not  and 
could  not  on  a  lower  reason.     In  this  doctrine,  we  are  simply 


180 

retjuired  to  suspend  the  ordinary  reason  at  the  biddhig  of  an 
extraordinary  reason,  which  is  not,  and  never  can  be,  unreason- 
able. Consequently,  there  is  in  the  doctrine  nothing  contrary 
to  reason,  and  the  Church,  in  enjoining  it,  does  not  enjoin  a  dog- 
ma which  contradicts  either  reason  or  the  senses,  though  she  un- 
questionably does  enjoin  a  dogma  which  is  above  reason.  The 
first  proof,  therefore,  that  the  doctrine  of  infallibility  "  leads  to 
skepticism,"  must  be  abandoned,  as  having  no  foundation  for 
itself. 

2.  The  second  proof  is  no  better.  That  certain  infidel  or 
paganizing  philosophers,  in  the  latter  part  of  the  fifteenth  and 
early  part  of  the  sixteenth  century,  maintained  that  proposi- 
tions may  be  philosophically  true,  yet  theologically  false,  we  con- 
cede; that  this  was  the  doctrine  of  the  Schoolmen,  or  that  it 
was  ever  for  a  moment  countenanced  by  the  Church,  we  deny. 
Indeed,  Leo  X.,  in-  Concilii  Lateranensis  Sess.  8,  1513,  con- 
demns it,  by  declaring  every  assertion  contrary  to  revealed  faith 
to  be  fiilse.  and  decreeing  that  all  persons  adhering  to  such  erro- 
neous assertions  be  avoided  and  punished  as  heretics, — tanquam 
hmreticos.  It  would  not  be  amiss,  if  tlie  Professor  would  bear 
in  mind  that  proofs  which  are  themselves  either  false  or  in  want 
of  proof  prove  nothing,  however  pertinent  they  may  be. 

We  cannot  follow  the  Professor  in  his  declamatory  specula- 
tions in  support  of  his  charge.  His  reasoning  is  all  fallacious. 
He  starts  with  the  assumption,  that  the  Church  is  falHble,  has 
no  authority  from  God  to  teach,  and  then  charges  her  with  con- 
sequences which  would  follow,  no  doubt,  if  she  were  fallible,  if 
she  had  no  divine  commission ;  for  they  are  the  precise  conse- 
quences which  do  follow  from  the  teaching,  or  rather  action,  of 
the  Protestant  sects.  If  the  Church  were  fallible,  a  mere  human 
authority,  arrogantly  claiming  to  teach  infalhbly,  wg  certainly 
should  not  defend  her,  or  dispute  that  her  influence  would  be 
as  bad  as  ^Ir.  Thornwell  falsely  alleges ;  but  we  do  not  recog- 
nize his  right  to  assume  the  fallibility  of  the  Church  as  the  basis 
of  his  proofs  that  she  is  not  infallible  ;  and  we  cannot  accept  as 
facts  mere  consequences  deduced  from  an  hypothesis  which  we 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  181 

deny,  and  which  is  not  yet  proved,  far  less  receive  them  as  proofs 
of  the  hypothesis. 

There  are  in  Cathohc  countries,  no  doubt,  many  unbehevers  ; 
but  before  this  can  be  adduced  as  evidence  that  the  Church,  by 
claiming  to  be  infaUible,  leads  them  into  unbelief,  it  is  necessary 
to  prove  that  she  is  not  infallible.     If  infallible,  sbe  cannot  have 
a  skeptical  tendency  ;  because  what  she  enjoins  must  be  infalli- 
ble truth,  and  skepticism,  w^hen  it  does  not  proceed  from  malice, 
results  always,  not  from  truth  being  present  to  the  mind,  but 
from  its  not  being  present.     But  it  is  w^orthy  of  remark,  that 
the  objections  to  Christianity  on  which  unbelievers  chiefly  rely 
are   not  drawn  from  the  distinctive  teachings  of  the  Catholic 
Church,  nor  from  the  Scriptuies  as  she  interprets  them.     They 
are  nearly  all  drawn  from  the  Scriptures  as  interpreted  by  pri- 
vate judo:ment,  and  hence,  as  w^e  should  expect,  infidelity  abounds 
chiefly  in  Protestant  countries.     Protestant  Germany,  England, 
the  United  States,  are,  any  one  of  them,  far  more  infidel  than 
even  France ;  and  our  own  city  cannot,  in  religious  behef,  com- 
pare favorably  with  Paris,  hifidel  as  Paris  unhappily  is.  Modern 
infidehty  is  of  Protestant  origin  ;  Giordano  Bruno  sojourned  in 
Protestant  England;  Bayle  was  a  Protestant,  and  resided  in 
Holland ;  Voltaire,  the  father  of  French  infidelity,  did  but  trans- 
port to  France  the  philosophy  of  the  Englishman  Locke,  and  the 
doctrines  and  objections  of  the  English  deists,  Herbert  of  Cher- 
bury,  Tindal,  Toland,  Chubb,  Morgan,  Woolston,  and  others. 
Indeed,  to  England  especially  belongs  the  chief  glory,  such  as  it 
is,  of  infidehzing  modern  society.      France  and  Germany   are 
nothing  but  her  pupils.     Rightly  do  Protestants  regard  her  as 
the  buhvark  of  their  religion ;  for  in  the  war  against  the  Church, 
against  the  revelation  of  Almighty  God,  she,  with  her  sanctimo- 
nious face  and   corrupt  heart,   has   the   chief  command.       It 
were  easy  to  show,  that,  aside  from  the  internal  malice  of  unbe- 
lievers, the  chief  cause  of  infidelity  in  modern  society  is  Protest- 
antism, which  asserts  the  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures,  and 
then  leaves  them  to  be  interpreted  by  private  judgment ;  but  it 
is  unnecessary.   It  is  becoming  every  day  more  and  more  obvious, 


182  THORN  well's    ANSWER 

that,  the  more  Protestants  circulate  the  Bible,  the  more  do  they 
multiply  scoffers  and  unbelievers. 

In  Letter  VIL  we  come  to  another  class  of  objections,  which 
we  may  term  moral  objections.  These  are  summed  up  in  the 
assertion,  The  Church  cannot  be  infallible,  because  her  "  infalli- 
bility is  conducive  to  hcentiousness  and  immorality."  (p.  105.) 
The  proof  of  this  is,  first,  the  unproved  assertion,  that  the  doc- 
trine of  the  infallibility  of  the  Church  leads  to  skepticism  ;  and, 
second,  the  allegation  that  Catholicity  and  Jesuitism  are  one  and 
the  same  thing.  The  first  assertion  we  dismiss,  for  we  have  just 
shown  that  the  Professor  does  not  sustain  it.  As  to  Jesuitism, 
we  hardly  know  what  to  say  ;  for  we  do  not  know,  and  the  au- 
thor does  not  inform  us,  what  is  meant  by  Jesuitism.  For  aught 
that  appears,  the  identity  asserted  may  be  conceded  without  pre- 
judice to  the  Church.  The  Society  of  Jesus  is  composed  of 
Catholic  priests,  and  we  are  not  aware  that  these  have  any  pe- 
culiar doctrines,  either  of  faith  or  morals.  Indeed,  they  could 
not  have ;  for  if  they  were  to  have  any,  they  would  be  obliged 
to  leave  the  Order  and  the  Church.  The  notion  among  some 
Protestants,  that  the  Jesuits  are  a  sect  in  the  bosom  of  the 
Church,  professing  certain  dogmas  of  faith  or  certain  principles 
of  morals  diflferent  from  those  professed  by  other  Catholics,  is  a 
ridiculous  blunder.  The  Church  enjoins  the  same  faith  and  the 
same  principles  of  morals  upon  all  her  children,  and  no  person, 
or  class  of  persons,  would  be  suffered  to  teach  in  her  commu- 
nion, who  should  add  to  or  take  from  them.  The  Jesuits  are 
Catholics,  neither  more  nor  less,  and  it  is  fair  to  presume  that  in 
faith  and  principles  of  morals  they  agree  with  all  Catholics,  and 
profess  what  the  Church  teaches. 

But  that  the  Jesuits  teach,  or  ever  have  taught,  doctrines  fa- 
vorable to  licentiousness  or  immorality  is  a  matter  to  be  proved, 
not  taken  for  granted.  What  is  the  proof  the  Professor  offers  ? 
Here  is  all  we  can  find : — "  These  three  cardinal  principles — of 
intention,  mental  reservation,  and  probability — cover  the  whole 
ground  of  Jesuitical  atrocity."  (p.  l\5^     The  Professor  labors 


TO    DK.    LYNCH.  183 

long  and  hard  to  identify  Catholicity  and  Jesuitism.  He  must, 
therefore,  concede  that  these  three  principles  cover  the  whole  of 
what  he  holds  to  be  atrocious  in  Catholicity.  Catholicity,  then, 
is  "  conducive  to  licentiousness  and  immorality,"  because  it  con- 
tains the  three  principles  of  "intention,  mental  reservation,  and 
probability."  But  what  is  the  meaning  the  Professor  attaches 
to  these  principles  ?  Unhappilv,  he  gives  us  no  clear  and  expli- 
cit answer ;  for  he  wTites  with  his  head  full  of  false  assumptions. 

"  The  detestable  principles,"  he  says,  "  of  the  graceless  order 

[the  Jesuits] may  be  found  embodied  in  the  recorded 

canons  of  general  councils.  That  the  end  justifies  the  means, 
that  the  interests  of  the  priesthood  are  superior  to  the  claims  of 
truth,  justice,  and  humanity,  is  necessarily  implied  in  the  decree 
of  the  Council  of  Lateran,  that  no  oaths  are  binding — that  to 
keep  them  is  perjury  rather  than  fidelity — which  conflict  with 
the  advantage  of  the  Church.  What  fraud  have  the  Jesuits 
ever  recommended  or  committed,  that  can  exceed  in  iniquity  the 
bloody  proceedings  of  the  Council  of  Constance  in  reference  to 
Huss  I  What  spirit  have  they  ever  breathed  more  deeply  im- 
bued with  cruelty  and  slaughter,  than  the  edict  of  Lateran  to 
kings  and  magistrates,  to  extirpate  heretics  from  the  face  of  the 
earth  ?  The  principle  on  which  the  sixteenth  canon  of  the  third 
Council  of  Lateran  proceeds  covers  the  doctrine  of  menial  re- 
servations. If  the  end  justifies  the  means,  if  we  can  be  per- 
jured with  impunity  to  protect  the  authority  of  the  priesthood, 
a  good  intention  will  certainly  sanctify  any  other  lie,  and  a  man 
may  always  be  sure  that  he  is  free  from  sin,  if  he  can  only  be 
sure  of  his  allegiance  to  Rome  and  his  antipathy  to  heretics. 
The  doctrine  of  probahility  is  in  full  accordance  with  the  spirit 
of  the  Papacy,  in  substituting  authority  for  evidence,  and  making 
the  opinions  of  men  the  arbiters  of  faith.  And  yet  these  three 
cardinal  principles  of  intention,  mental  reservation,  and  proba- 
bility, which  are  so  thoroughly  Papal,  cover  the  whole  ground 
of  Jesuitical  atrocity." — pp.  114,  115. 

It  would  seem  from  this,  that  the  Professor  understands  by 
the  principle  of  intention,  that  the  moral  character  of  the  actor 
is  determined  by  the  intention  with  which  he  acts ;  by  that  of 
mental  reservation,  that  no  one  can  bind  himself  by  oath  to  do 
that  which  conflicts  with  the  advantage  of  the  Church ;  and  by 


184  THORN  well's    ANSWER 

tliat  of  probability,  the  substituting  of  authority  for  evidence, 
and  making  the  opinions  of  men  the  arbiters  of  faith.  If  this 
is  not  his  meaning,  we  are  unable  to  divine  what  it  is. 

That  Catholicity  teaches  that  the  moral  character  of  the  ac- 
tor is  determined  by  his  intention,  or,  in  other  words,  that  a 
man  is  to  be  judged  according  to  his  intention,  may  be  true  • 
but  this  must  be  morally  wrong,  or  it  cannot  be  adduced  as  a 
proof  that  the  teaching  of  the  Church  is  "  conducive  to  licen- 
tiousness and  immorality."  That  this  is  morally  wrong,  the  Pro- 
fessor does  not  prove,  or  even  attempt  to  prove.  For  ourselves, 
we  are  not  now  called  upon  to  prove  that  it  is  right.  It  is  for 
the  Professor  to  prove  that  it  is  wrong.  But  we  own,  that,  from 
our  boyhood,  we  have  always  supposed  it  a  dictate  of  reason  that 
the  man  is  to  be  praised  or  blamed  according  to  his  intention. 
If  I  really  intend  to  do  a  man  evil,  my  unintentional  failure  to 
do  him  evil  does  not  exonerate  me  from  guilt ;  if  I  really  intend 
to  do  him  good,  but,  in  attempting  to  do  him  good,  unintention- 
ally do  hiin  evil,  I  am  not  guilty.  If  I  have  killed  a  man  in 
self-defence,  the  law  excuses  or  justifies  me ;  and  it  does  not 
hold  me  guilty  of  murder,  unless  the  killing  has  been  done  with 
a  felonious  intent.  He  who  takes  the  life  of  a  fellow-being 
through  private  revenge  is  a  murderer ;  the  public  officer  who 
does  it  in  pursuance  of  a  judicial  sentence  is  no  murderer,  and 
does  but  a  justifiable  act.  Whence  the  diflference,  if  not  in  the 
difference  of  intention  ?  That  no  act,  in  relation  to  the  actor,  is 
blameworthy  unless  done  from  a  malicious  intention,  or  praise- 
worthy unless  done  from  a  virtuous  intention,  we  have  always 
supposed  to  be  the  teaching  of  reason,  and  we  must  have  high 
authority  to  convince  us  that  we  have  been  wrong. 

"  But  on  this  ground  the  Church  erects  her  doctrine,  that  the 
end  justifies  the  means."  We  cannot  concede  this ;  first,  because 
the  Church  has  no  such  doctrine  ;  and  second,  because  the  prin- 
ciple does  not  imply  it.  The  assertion,  that  the  Church  teaches, 
that  any  Catholic  doctor  teaches,  or  ever  did  teach,  that  the  end 
justifies  the  means,  is  made  without  the  faintest  shadow  of  a 
reason,  and  the  reverse  is  what  she  does  teach,  as  every  man 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  185 

knows  who  knows  anj'thing  of  her  teaching.  Tlie  doctrine  of 
intention  objected  to  implies  nothing  of  the  sort.  The  Church 
teaches,  indeed,  that  the  act  for  which  we  are  accountable  is  the 
act  of  the  will ;  but  she  teaches  that  no  act  is  done  with  a  ofood 
intention  that  is  not  referred  to  God  as  the  ultimate  end,  and 
that  every  one  of  our  acts  is  to  be  so  referred.  Now,  in  choosing 
the  means,  we  as  much  act  as  we  do  in  the  choice  of  the  end, 
and  therefore  must  be,  as  to  the  means,  bound  by  the  same  law 
which  binds  us  as  to  the  end ;  and  then  we  can  no  more  choose 
unjust  means  than  we  can  unjust  ends,  and  therefore  can  be 
allowed  to  seek  even  just  ends  only  by  just  means. 

The  Professor  says  that  "  the  Jesuit  Casnedi  maintains  in  a 
published  work,  that  at  the  day  of  judgment  God  will  say  to 
many,  '  Come,  my  beloved,  you  who  have  committed  murder, 
blasphemed,  &c.,  because  you  beheved  that  in  so  doing  you  were 
right.' "  But  he  takes  good  care  not  to  give  us  a  reference  to 
the  work  itself,  and  we  hazard  nothing  in  saying  that  no  Jesuit 
ever  published  such  a  sentence,  unless  it  was  to  condemn  it,  as 
containing  a  Protestant  heresy.  That  invincible  ignorance,  if 
really  invincible,  excuses  from  sin,  is,  no  doubt,  a  doctrine  of  the 
Church ;  for  she  teaches  that  no  one  can  sin  in  not  doing  that 
which  he  has  no  power  to  do.  No  doubt,  involuntary  mistakes,  if 
unavoidable,  springing  from  no  malice  in  the  will,  from  no  cul- 
pable neglect  of  ours,  are  excusable  ;  but  no  Catholic  divine  ever 
taught  that  invincible  ignorance  can  extend  to  the  great  precepts 
of  the  natural  law,  to  such  as  forbid  murder,  blasphemy,  &c. ; 
for  they  are  engraven  on  the  heart  of  every  man,  and  are  evident 
to  every  man  by  the  light  of  natural  reason.  The  Professor  has 
been  misled,  by  relying  on  the  authority  of  Pascal,  and  other 
writers  of  his  stamp.  He  refers  us  to  Pascal's  Provincial  Letters 
"  for  a  popular  exposition  of  the  morality  of  the  Jesuits."  He 
might  as  well  refer  us  to  Voltaire's  PhilosojAical  Dictionary 
for  a  popular  exposition  of  the  morality  of  the  Gospel.  Pascal 
was  a  Jansenist,  and  Jansenists  are  heretics,  not  Catholics,  The 
Provincial  Letters  are  witty,  but  wicked, — a  tissue  of  hes, 
forgeries,  and  misrepresentations,  from  beginning  to  end,  as  has 


186  THORNWELL  S    ANSWER 

been  amply  proved  over  and  over  again.  If  Mr.  TLornwell  is 
ignorant  of  this  fact,  lie  will  have  to  search  long  before  he  will 
find  a  Catholic  or  a  Jesuit  doctor  that  will  permit  him  to  hold 
that  his  ignorance  is  excusable.'*'' 

*  In  ordinary  times,  what  we  have  said  in  the  text  is  all  that  would 
need  to  be  said  in  reference  to  the  Society  of  Jesus  ;  but  now,  when  the 
Society  is  suffering  a  severe  persecution,  even  in  Catholic  countries,  we 
are  unwilling  to  pass  the  subject  over  without  bearing  our  testimony, 
feeble  as  it  is,  in  favor  of  the  children  of  St.  Ignatius.  We  do  this  the 
more  willingly,  because  we  are  conscious  that  we  have  ourselves  fre- 
quently done  them  injustice,  both  in  our  thoughts  and  in  our  words. 
It  is  hard,  when  we  hear  a  body  of  men  widely  and  constantly  decried, 
not  to  be  more  or  less  prejudiced  against  them  ;  and  nothing  is  more 
natural  than,  when  under  the  influence  of  this  prejudice,  to  exaggerate 
beyond  all  reasonable  bounds  the  slight  imperfections  we  may  observe 
in  here  and  there  an  individual  member,  and  to  generalize  them,  into 
characteristics  of  the  body  itself.  Few  persons  have  been  more  preju- 
diced against  the  Society  of  Jesus  than  we  ourselves.  But  having  taken 
some  pains  to  find  a  basis  for  the  unfavorable  judgment  we  had  formed, 
we  hardly  know  when  or  how,  we  confess  that  we  have  been  entirely 
unsuccessful.  There  may  have  been  individual  Jesuits  whose  conduct 
we  could  not  approve,  but  we  are  satisfied,  after  studying  the  history  of 
the  Order,  that  it  needs  no  other  defence  than  a  simple  statement  of 
facts,  and  no  other  eulogium  than  the  recital  of  its  deeds. 

Every  body  knows  the  popular  meaning  attached  to  Jesuitical.  Tak- 
ing the  word  in  this  meaning,  there  are  no  men  so  little  Jesuitical  as 
the  Jesuits.  Their  whole  history  proves  thern  to  be  remarkable  for  their 
simplicity  of  heart,  singleness  of  purpose,  and  straightforwardness  of 
conduct  No  man  can  take  up  a  work  in  defence  of  the  Order,  written 
by  a  member,  without  being  fully  convinced  that  the  Jesuit  is  the  anti- 
thesis of  the  character  commonly  ascribed  to  him.  We  have  heard 
many  charges,  and  grave  charges,  against  him  ;  but  we  have  not  heard 
one  that  we  have  not  seen  refuted.  Jesuits  are  men,  and,  of  course, 
suffer  more  or  less  the  infirmities  common  to  all  men;  but  we  should 
like  to  be  shown  a  body  of  men,  of  equal  numbers,  placed  in  the  try- 
ing circumstances  in  which  they  have  been,  who  have  shown  less  of 
human  infirmity,  or  been  more  true  to  the  motto.  Ad  majorem  Dei 
Gloriam.  There  is  no  field  of  science  or  art  which  they  have  not  culti- 
vated with  success;  no  department  of  literature  which  they  have  not 
enriched  with  their  contributions  ;  scarcely  a  nation  to  which  they  have 
not  preached  the  cross ;  and  hardly  a  land  which  they  have  not  conse- 
crated with  the  blood  of  their  martyrs. 


TO    DR.    LYNCH. 


187 


1.  The  principle  of  mental  reservation  happens  to  he  no 
Catholic  docti-ine.  Protestants  would,  no  doubt,  be  pleased  to 
find  that  the  Church  teaches  that  lying  is  sometimes  justifiable, 
for  such  a  doctrine  is  one  they  stand  very  much  in  need  of;  but 

Even  the  present  persecution  of  the  Society  is  to  its  glory.  If  the 
Jesuits  had  been  political  demagogues,— if  they  had  been  violent  radi- 
cals, ready  to  sacrifice  liberty  to  license,  order  to  anarchy,  religion  to 
politics,  heaven  to  earth,— our  ears  would  not  have  been  stunned  with 
maddened  outcries  against  them;  the  world  would  have  owned  them 
as  her  children,  and  the  age  would  have  delighted  to  honor  them.  We 
know  it  is  pretended  that  they  are  the  enemies  of  liberty  and  the  friends 
of  despotism,  but  it  needs  only  a  sUght  knowledge  of  facts  to  know  that 
this  is  mere  pretence.  Liberty  has  more  than  once  found  her  noblest 
champion  in  the  Jesuits,  and  the  hostility  a  year  or  two  since  manifested 
to  them  in  France  was  because  they  demanded  the  freedom  of  educa- 
tion, a  right  guarantied  by  the  Charter  itself.  They  may  not  be,  in 
these  days,  foremost  among  those  who  stir  up  rebellions  and  revolutions  ; 
they  may  not  regard  the  fearful  events  which  have  recently  taken 
place  in  Europe,  as  sure  to  bring  back  the  golden  age  of  the  poets; 
they  may  hold  their  mission  to  be  spiritual,  rather  than  political,  and 
believe  it  more  important  to  convert  individuals  and  nations  to  God 
than  to  one  political  creed  or  another  ;  but  if  so,  it  does  not  follow  that 
they  are  wrong,  or  that  for  this  very  reason  they  are  not  all  the  more 
worthy  of  our  respect  and  confidence. 

The  Society  of  Jesus  was  instituted,  not  for  political,  but  for  religious 
purposes,  and  its  members,  by  their  profession,  are  devoted  to  preaching 
the  Gospel,  hearing  confessions,  and  educating  youth,  and  that  not  for 
one  country  only,  but  for  all  countries.  These  ends  are  the  same  and 
of  equal  importance  everywhere  and  under  all  forms  of  government. 
If  the  Jesuits  were  to  adopt  a  political  creed,  and  become  its  propagan- 
dists, how  could  they  devote  themselves  to  the  ends  of  their  institute, 
alike  under  the  monarchy  of  Europe  and  the  democracy  of  America? 
What  course  would  or  could  be  proper  for  them,  but  to  abstain  from 
declaring  themselves  in  favor  of  any  particular  form  of  government, 
and  to  content  themselves  with  simply  inculcating  upon  all  citizens  to 
obey  the  legitimate  government  of  their  country,  whatever  its  form  or 
constitution? 

The  charge  against  the  Jesuits  of  being  in  favor  of  this  or  that  form 
of  government  arises  from  their  refusal  to  declare  themselves  in  favor 
of  one  or  another,  from  the  fact  that  they  have  no  political  creed,  and 
make  it  a  point  of  duty  to  stand  aloof  from  politics,  and  to  confine  them- 
selves to  the  discharge  of  their  spiritual  functions.      They  obey  the 


188  thornwell's  answer 

she  teaches  nothing  of  the  sort.  She  does  not  command  her 
children  at  all  times  and  on  all  occasions  to  speak  all  the  truth 
they  may  happen  to  know,  but  she  does  command  them  never 
to  speak  any  thing  but  the  truth  ;  and  she  teaches  them,  that, 

powers  that  be,  and  comport  themselves  as  loyal  subjects  to  the  author- 
ity of  the  country,  whether  it  be  autocracy,  as  in  Russia,  constitution- 
alism, as  in  France  and  Great  Britain,  or  republicanism,  as  in  America. 
What  more  could  we  ask  of  them  ?  If  tyrants  denounce  them  because 
they  will  not  turn  defenders  of  tyranny,  if  revolutionists  denounce  them 
because  they  will  not  join  in  the  war  against  legitimate  authority,  whose 
fault  is  it?  Are  we  to  condemn  the  Jesuits  because  tyrants  and  revolu- 
tionists wrong  them  ? 

Wherever  the  Jesuits  are  permitted  to  establish  themselves,  they  are 
a  blessing.  It  is  not  easy  to  estimate  the  value  to  this  country  of  their 
services  as  instructors  of  our  youth.  It  would  be  difficult  to  find  a  sub- 
stitute for  them  as  educators.  In  every  part  of  the  country,  they  are, 
for  the  pure  love  of  God,  founding  colleges,  and  training  up  our  child- 
ren in  the  way  they  should  go.  Is  this  nothing?  These  colleges  are 
but  of  yesterday,  yet  have  they  already  done  great  service, — as  we  our- 
selves can  personally  testify,  and  who  have  peculiar  reason  to  thank 
Almighty  God  for  raising  up  and  moving  the  good  fathers  to  devote 
theinselves  to  the  important  work  of  education.  But  as  yet  they  have 
really  done  nothing,  in  comparison  with  what  they  will  do.  They 
now  rank  among  the  best  in  the  country,  and  in  a  few  years  they  will 
place  education  with  us  at  least  on  a  level  with  what  it  is  in  the  most 
favored  countries  of  the  Old  World.  And  can  we  count  this  small 
service  ? 

Worldings  may  despise  the  Jesuits,  infidels  and  heretics  may  calum- 
niate them;  misguided  Catholics,  whose  faith  is  but  a  dead  faith,  may 
distrust  them  ;  but  the  world  needs  them,  our  own  country  needs  them, 
and  though  the  Church  is  dependent  on  no  religious  order,  they  are 
not  the  least  efficient  of  her  servants.  Protestants,  in  their  estimation 
of  the  Jesuit,  betray  only  their  ignorance  or  their  malice,  or  both.  The 
character  they  ascribe  to  the  Jesuit  they  will  find  in  its  perfection  in 
their  own  ministers,  and  the  best  definition  of  Jesuitical,  in  the  popu- 
lar acceptation  of  the  term,  is  a  Presbyterian  minister,  the  antithesis 
of  a  Jesuit.  Mr.  Thornwell  illustrates  and  accepts,  in  the  book  be- 
fore us,  every  element  of  what  he  calls  Jesuitism.  No  man  can  have 
been  brought  up  among  Presbyterians  without  knov^-ing  that  the  prin- 
ciple, the  end  justifies  the  means,  is  the  one  on  which  they  generally 
act,  whether  they  avow  it  or  not.  No  one  can  read  one  of  their  books 
against  the  Church  without  perceiving  that  the  principle  of  mental 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  189 

when  they  use  words  which  by  their  natural  force  convey  a  false 
sense,  they  speak  flilsehood,  whatever  may  have  been  their  secret 
meaning,  and  that  knowingly  and  intentionally  to  use  language 
which  is  naturally  calculated  to  deceive  the  hearer,  to  convey  to 
him  a  false  meaning,  or  a  meaning  different  from  that  in  the 
mind  of  him  that  uses  it,  is  to  lie,  to  sin  against  God.  All  who 
are  acquainted  with  Catholic  morality  know  that  this  is  her 
teaching,  and  whoever  asserts  the  contrary  is  guilty  of  the  very 
offence  he  would  fasten  upon  her,  and  has  no  excuse  for  his  con- 
duct. For  if  he  is  ignorant  of  her  doctrine,  he  speaks  rashly ; 
if  he  is  not  ignorant,  he  is  guilty  of  a  wilful  falsehood. 

2.  The  facts  which  the  Professor  alleges,  granting  them  to  be 
facts,  do  not  prove  the  principle  of  mental  reservation.  We 
presume  the  Professor  wishes  to  maintain  that  the  Church 
teaches  that  it  is  lawful  for  her  children  to  take  oaths  which 
conflict  with  her  advantage,  but  that  they  must  take  them  with 
the  mental  reservation,  not  to  keep  them  ;  and  that  if  so  taken, 
it  is  no  sin  to  break  them.  This  is  what  he  needs  in  order  to 
make  out  his  case.    But  this  he  does  not  prove.     Granting  that 

reservation,  or,  in  plain  terms,  the  right  to  lie  for  the  purpose  of  ad- 
vancing Protestantism,  is  a  principle  which  they  practically  adopt,  and 
hold  in  constant  requisition  ;  and  whoever  will  read  a  Presbyterian  dog- 
matical work  will  see  that  to  higher  certainty  than  probability  its  au- 
thor does  not  aspire,  and  that  to  substitute  authority  for  evidence,  and 
to  make  the  opinions  of  men  the  the  arbiters  of  faith,  is  his  boast. 
Nothing  is  more  ridiculous  than  for  a  Presbyterian  minister  to  accuse 
Jesuits  of  a  want  of  principle,  of  candor,  of  honesty,  or  to  charge  them 
with  fraud  and  cruelty.  Who  ever  heard  of  a  Presbyterian  minister 
that  was  not,  officially,  the  very  impersonation  of  pride,  cant,  hypoc- 
risy, bigotry,  and  cruelty  ?  If  such  a  one  there  ever  was,  we  may  be 
sure  that  he  did  not  live  and  die  a  Presbyterian.  We  know  something 
of  Presbyterianism  ;  it  was  our  misfortune  to  have  been  brought  up  a 
Presbyterian.  We  know  what  are  its  secret  covenants,  the  pledges  it 
exacts  of  its  adherents,  and  the  measures  it  takes  to  prevent  the  least 
ray  of  light  from  penetrating  their  darkness.  Take  a  Protestant's  ac- 
count of  Catholicity  or  Jesuitism,  change  the  name,  and  it  is  a  faithful 
picture  as  far  as  it  goes,  of  proud,  arrogant,  bigoted,  cruel,  and  perse- 
cuting Presbyterianism.  There  is  not  a  charge  brought  against  us  by 
Presbyterians  that  is  not  substantially  true  of  them. 


190  thornwell's  answer 

he  has  rightly  stated  the  doctrine  of  the  Council  of  Lateran, — he 
does  not  tell  us  which  council, — all  he  proves  is,  that  the  Church 
teaches  that  no  oath  taken  to  her  prejudice  is  binding ;  but  he 
does  not  prove  that  she  teaches  that  the  reason  why  it  is  not 
binding  is  because  it  was  taken  with  a  mental  reservation  not  to 
keep  it  in  case  it  conflicted  with  her  advantage.  For  aught  that 
appears,  the  reason  why  the  Church  declares  that  such  oaths  do 
not  bind  is  because  she  holds  them  to  be  unlawful  oaths, — oaths 
which  no  man  has  a  right  to  take,  and  which  therefore  are  void 
ab  initio.  The  Professor  will  hardly  maintain  the  morality  of 
robbers  and  cutthroats,  that  a  man  who  has  taken  an  unlawful 
oath  is  bound  to  keep  it.  He  will  hardly  pretend  that  he  who 
should  swear  to  assist  in  a  plot  for  blowing  up  the  Presbyterian 
Assembly  when  in  session,  for  instance,  would  be  bound  to  keep 
his  oath,  or  to  refrain  from  revealing  the  plot,  simply  because  he 
had  sworn  not  to  do  so.  The  whole  sum  and  substance  of  the 
charge,  then,  is,  that  the  Jesuits  and  the  Church  teach  that  un- 
lawful oaths  do  not  land.  Does  this  conflict  with  reason  ?  Is 
this  "  conducive  to  licentiousness  and  immorality?"  Is  it  im- 
moral to  teach  that  no  man  can  bind  himself  to  do  wrong  ? 

But  in  this  the  Church  teaches  that  "  the  interests  of  the 
priesthood  are  superior  to  the  claims  of  truth,  justice,  and  hu- 
manity ;  for  she  holds  that  all  oaths  which  conflict  with  her 
advantage  are  unlawful."  The  conclusion  is  not  necessary,  for 
it  may  be  that  her  interests,  her  advantage,  are  identical  with  the 
claims  of  truth,  justice,  and  humanity ;  or  that  it  is  only  by  pro- 
moting her  interests  and  seeking  her  advantage  that  it  is  possible 
to  vindicate  the  claims  of  truth,  justice  and  humanity.  If  she 
be  what  she  professes  to  be,  this  must  be  so ;  and  that  she  is 
what  she  professes  to  be  the  Professor  must  presume  till  he  has 
proved  the  contrary.  If  she  be  the  Church  of  God,  any  oath 
i4  her  prejudice  is  an  oath  against  God,  and  no  man  can  be  mad 
enough  to  say  that  an  oath  against  God  can  bind,  or  that  the 
claims  of  truth,  justice,  or  humanity  can  be  prejudiced  by  not 
keeping  it.  But  the  Professor  cannot  assume  that  she  is  not  the 
Church  of  God,  for  that  she  is  not,  is  the  very  point  he  is   to 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  !91 

prove,  and  he  cannot  prove  this  by  assuming  it,  and  making  the 
assumption  the  principle  of  his  arguments  to  prove  it.  Such  a 
procedure  would  simply  beg  the  question.  Granting,  then, 
that  the  Church  does  teach  that  oaths  to  her  prejudice  are  un- 
lawful, and  therefore  do  not  bind,  nothing  proves  that  she  is  not 
right  in  so  doing,  and  therefore  nothing  proves  that  in  doing 
so  she  favors  "  licentiousness  and  immorality."  To  condemn  the 
Church,  on  the  ground  the  Professor  assumes,  would  be  to  assert 
the  docti-ine  opposite  to  hers  ;  namely,  unlawful  oaths  are  to  be 
kept, — that,  if  I  have  been  foolish  or.  wicked  enough  to  sw^ear  to 
do  wrong,  I  am  bound  in  conscience  to  keep  my  oath  and  do  the 
wrong, — a  monstrous  doctrine,  which  strikes  at  the  foundation 
of  all  morals.  It  i^  strange  what  blunders  Protestants  commit, 
in  trying  to  get  an  argument  against  the  Church.  It  would  seem 
as  if  it  never  occurred  to  them  to  examine  the  principle  of  the 
objections  they  urge.  They  seem  to  say,  if  the  Church  should 
favor  licentiousness  and  immorality,  then  she  w^ould  not  be  the 
Church  of  God ;  therefore  she  does  favor  licentiousness  and 
immorality.    The  Church  forbids  unlawful  oathes. 

3.  The  Professor,  evidently,  is  ignorant  of  the  principle  of 
probability,  or  probabilism,  as  understood  by  Catholic  theolo- 
gians. That  principle,  if  he  did  but  know  it,  is  very  nearly  the 
contrary  of  what  he  supposes,  and  is  little  else  than  the  well- 
known  maxim  of  the  Common  Law,  that,  if  there  is  a  reasonable 
doubt,  the  accused  is  entitled  to  its  benefit.  But  the  principle, 
as  the  Professor  defines  it,  is  not  embraced  by  the  Church,  nor 
defended  by  a  single  Catholic  divine.  He  says,  the  Church  sub- 
stitutes "  authority  for  evidence,  and  makes  the  opinions  of  men 
the  arbiters  of  ftnth ; "  but  this,  in  principle,  at  least,  is  a  mis- 
take ;  for  the  Church  teaches  that  God  alone  is  the  arbiter  of 
faith,  and  that  nothing  but  his  word,  declared  to  be  his  word, 
by  himself  through  his  dixdnely  appointed  organ,  can  be  of  faith. 
His  word  divinely  declared  to  be  his  word  is  the  highest  evi- 
dence reason  can  demand  or  receive;  and  if  the  Church  is 
proved  to  reason  to  be  his  organ  for  declaring  his  word,  reason 
has  the  highest  e\ddence  possible  for  believing  that  whatever 


192 

she  teaches  as  the  word  of  God  is  inftillibly  true.  She  asserts 
that  reason  has  the  right  to  demand  this  evidence,  and  has  no 
right  to  dispense  with  it.  In  principle,  then,  she  denies  the 
principle  of  probabiUty  as  set  forth  by  the  Professor.  If  she  is 
what  she  claims  to  be,  she  denies  it  in  her  practice,  and  cannot 
possibly  do  as  alleged.  That  she  is  what  she  professes  to  be 
the  Professor  is  bound,  as  we  have  already  shown,  to  presume 
till  he  makes  the  contrary  appear ;  which  he  does  not  do. 

The  Professor  identifies  Jesuitism  with  Catholicity,  and  re- 
solves all  that  is  atrocious  in  Jesuitism  into  the  three  principles 
enumerated,  and  therefore  all  that  is  atrocious  in  Catholicity. 
But  the  first  of  these  principles  is  a  simple  dictate  of  reason, 
and  contains  nothing;  atrocious.  Then  all  that  is  atrocious  in 
Catholicity,  or  all  the  atrocity  that  can  be  charged  upon  Catho- 
licity, is  resolvable  into  the  other  two  principles,  namely,  mental 
reservation  and  probability.  But  these  are  not  Catholic  pj-inci- 
ples,  and,  however  atrocious  they  may  be,  their  atrocity  cannot 
be  charged  to  her.  Therefore  no  atrocity  can  be  charged  to  her, 
even  according  to  the  Professor's  own  argument.  But  to  be 
"conducive  to  licentiousness  and  immorality"  is  undeniably 
atrocious.  Therefore  the  Church  is  not  conducive  to  them.  So 
the  Professor  does  not  sustain  his  assertion,  that  "  Papal  infalli- 
bility is  conducive  to  licentiousness  and  immorality."  Assuredly, 
the  Professor  is  ignorant  of  the  laws  of  evidence. 

The  next  proof  oflered  against  the  infallibility  of  the  Church 
is,  that  "it  is  the  patron  of  superstition  and  will-worship." 
(p.  116.)  This  is  a  singular  objection.  How  infallihility  can 
patronize  superstition  and  will-worship,  that  is,  -z^e/Z-worship,  or 
the  worship  of  wells,  conceding  them  to  be  wrong,  is  more  than 
we  are  able  to  conceive.  Inflillibility  can  be  the  patron  of  noth- 
ing wrong,  and  the  Professor,  if  he  should  prove  his  thesis,  would 
prove  that  supei'stition  and  will-worship  are  right,  not  that  the 
Church  is  fallible.  Can  he  mean  that  the  assertion  of  her  in- 
fallibility is  the  patron  of  superstition  and  will-worship  ?  But 
this  he  would  be  troubled  to  prove,  even  if  he  should  prove  the 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  193 

existence  of  superstition  and  will-worship  in  the  Church ;  for 
they  undeniably  exist  out  of  the  Church,  in  communities  which 
Liy  no  claim  to  infallibility.  Does  he  mean  that  the  Church  is 
not  infallible,  because  she  is  the  patron  of  superstition,  &c.  ? 
Why,  then,  did  he  not  say  so  ?  If  this  is  his  meaning,  his  argu- 
ment is  valid,  if  the  fact  be  as  alleged.  But,  unhappily  for  his 
cause,  the  fact  is  not  as  alleged.*  Catholics  pay  divine  honors  to 
God  alone,  as  every  one  knows  who  knows  any  thing  of  Cathohc 
worship.  That  we  keep  relics,  pictures,  and  images,  and  pay 
them  a  relative  honor  as  memorials  of  departed  sanctity,  we 
admit ;  that  we  venerate  the  Saints,  especially  the  Ever-blessed 
Virg-in,  the  Most  Holy  Mother  of  God,  we  also  admit ;  but  that 
this  is  superstition  or  will-worship  we  deny,  and  the  Professor 
must  prove,  or  not  assert  it. 

The  last  proof  of  the  fallibility  of  the  Church  which  the  Pro- 
fessor attempts  to  offer  is,  that  she  is  not  infallible,  for  "  she  is 
hostile  to  civil  government."  (p.  143.)  His  argument  is,  when 
reduced  to  form, — the  church  that  claims  and  exercises  temporal 
authority  is  hostile  to  civil  government ;  but  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic Church  claims  and  exercises  temporal  authority;  therefore 
she  is  hostile  to  civil  government.  The  church  that  is  hostile 
to  civil  government  is  fallible  ;  but  the  Roman  Catholic  Church 
is  hostile  to  civil  government ;  therefore,  the  Roman  Catholic 
Church  is  fallible,  that  is,  not  infallible. 

The  church  that  claims  and  exercises  supreme  temporal  autho- 
rity is  hostile  to  civil  government,  if  she  has  received  from  Al- 
mighty God  no  grant  of  that  temporal  authority,  we  concede  ; 
if  she  has  received  the  grant,  we  deny.  No  church  which  pos- 
sesses, by  the  Divine  grant,  temporal  authority,  can  be  hostile 
to  civil  government  by  claiming  and  exercising  it,  because  she  is 
herself,  under  God,  the  civil  government.  But  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church,  if  she  has  received  the  grant,  does  thus  pos- 
sess the  temporal  authority.  Therefore,  if  she  claims  and  exer- 
cises that  authority,  she  is  not  hostile  to  civil  goverment. 

*  The  reader  w^ill  find  this  objection  replied  to  at  length  in  Brown- 
son's  Quarterly  Review  for  January,  1848,  pp.  101-116. 


194  thornwell's  answer 

The  cliurcli  that  is  hostile  to  all  government  in  civil  affairs  la 
fallible,  we  concede ;  for  the  necessity  of  government  in  civil 
affairs  is  clearly  evinced  from  reason  ;  the  church  that  is  hostile 
only  to  distinct  and  independent  civil  government  is  fallible,  we 
deny,  for  it  may  be  that  God  has  vested  the  government  of  civil 
as  well  as  spiritual  affairs  in  the  same  hands.  The  denial  of 
civil  government  distinct  from  and  independent  of  the  Church 
is  a  proof  of  faUibility  only  on  the  supposition  that  such  civil 
government  exists  by  divine  right.  But  if  all  government,  civil 
as  well  as  spiritual,  is  vested  in  the  Church,  it  does  not  so  exist. 
Therefore  its  denial  is  no  proof  of  fallibility.  Moreover,  the 
Koman  Catholic  Church,  as  we  have  seen,  cannot  be  hostile  to 
civil  government,  even  if  she  claim  and  exercise  the  supreme 
temporal  authority,  if  she  has  received  it  as  a  grant  from  God, 
the  Supreme  Ruler.  But  it  is  not  proved  that  she  claims  or  ex- 
ercises it  without  such  grant.  Therefore  it  is  not  proved  that 
she  is  hostile  to  civil  government ;  and  therefore,  again,  it  is  not 
proved  that  she  is  fiUible.  The  Professor  labors  to  pro\-e,  that, 
according  to  Catholicity,  "  the  Pope  is  the  vicar  of  the  Omnipo- 
tent God,  invested  alike  with  temporal  power  and  ecclesiastical 
authority."  (p.  147.)  If  so,  the  Pope  is  the  vicar  of  God  in 
both  orders,  and  is  invested  with  the  supreme  authority  in  both. 
Then  he  is  by  divine  appointment  the  temporal  sovereign.  But 
for  the  temporal  sovereign  to  claim  a.nd  exercise  temporal  autho- 
rity is  not  to  be  hostile  to  the  civil  government,  but  to  assert  and 
maintain  it. 

But  the  claim  of  the  Church  to  "secular  authority  merges 
the  state  in  the  Church.  Kings  and  emperors,  nations  and  com- 
munities, become  merely  the  instruments  and  pliant  tools  of 
spiritual  dominion."  (page.  158.)  What  if  the  spiritual  do- 
minion be  legimate  ?  All  power  is  of  God,  and  there  is  no  legit- 
imate authority  not  from  him.  Kings,  emperoi-s,  nations,  com- 
munities, have  no  right  to  exercise  temporal  authority,  save  as 
vicars  of  the  Onmipotent  God,  and  it  is  only  for  the  reason  that 
they  are  such  that  we  are  under  any  obligation  to  obey  them. 
If  Almighty  God  has  made  the  Pope  his  sole  vicar  in  both 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  19o 

ordei^,  obedience  is  due  to  him  by  all  both  in  church  and  state, 
and  then  it  is  no  objection  to  the  Church  that  she  exacts  the 
submission  of  kings,  emperors,  nations,  communities,  for  they 
can,  in  such  case,  have  no  authority  not  derived  fi'om  God 
through  the  Pope.  The  Professor,  if  he  grant  that  the  Pope  is 
the  vicar  of  Almighty  God  in  the  temporal  and  in  the  spiritual 
order,  cannot  urge  his  objection,  because  in  doing  so  he  would 
resist  the  authority  of  the  vicar  of  God,  and  therefore  of  God 
himself. 

x\gain,  if  the  Pope  be  the  vicar  of  God  in  both  orders,  the 
claim  and  exercise  of  the  supreme  temporal  dominion  do  not 
merge  the  state  in  the  church,  for  then  the  Church  is  both  church 
and  state.  The  Church  could  merge  the  state  in  herself  by 
claiming  and  exercising  temporal  power,  only  on  condition  that 
she  had  received  no  special  grant  of  temporal  pow^r,  and  claimed 
to  exercise  it  solely  by  virtue  of  her  grant  of  spiritual  authority. 
But  if  she  teaches,  as  the  Professor  contends,  that  in  the  Pope 
she  has  been  invested  with  temporal  as  ivell  as  with  sjnritual 
authority^  she  does  not  do  this,  that  is,  does  not  claim  the  tem- 
poral as  incidental  to  the  spiritual.  Therefore,  even  granting 
that  she  claims  the  supreme  temporal  authority,  she  does  not 
and  cannot  merge  the  state  in  the  Church  as  a  spiritual  author- 
ity, which  is  the  sense  intended.  This  is  evinced  from  the  in- 
stance of  the  Papal  states.  The  Pope  in  regard  to  them  is  su- 
preme in  both  temporals  and  spirituals,  but  they  exist  as  a  state, 
as  a  civil  government,  as  much  so  as  Tuscany  or  Sardinia. 

The  Professor  does  not  appear  to  understand  the  question  he 
wishes  to  discuss.  The  spiritual  order  is  undeniably  superior  to 
the  temporal,  and  nothing  can  be  legitimately  concluded  from 
the.  temporal  to  the  prejudice  of  the  spiritual.  No  man  who 
has  any  knowledge  of  even  natural  morality  can  pretend  that  it 
is  the  prerogative  of  the  temporal  order  to  define  or  give  law  to 
the  spiritual.  It  is  not  according  to  reason  that  the  lower  should 
rule  the  higher,  the  body  the  soul,  for  instance,  or  the  state  the 
Church.  To  object  to  the  Church  that  she  subjects  the  whole 
temporal  order  to  the  spiritual  order,  or  that  she  makes  the  spir- 


196 

itual  dominion  supreme,  is  to  make  an  objection  which  reason 
disavows,  because  it  would  be  in  principle  the  same  as  to  deny 
the  right  of  reason  to  rule  the  flesh,  nay,  the  same  as  to  deny 
reason  itself.  The  Church,  if  she  is  God's  Church,  if  she  has 
received  plenary  spiritual  authority  as  the  vicar  of  the  Omnipo- 
tent God,  must  needs  be  superior  to  the  state,  and  the  state  can 
have  no  authority  to  do  aught  she  declares  to  be  sinful  or  mor- 
ally wrong,  and  must  be  bound  to  do  whatever  she  declares  to 
be  required  by  the  law  of  God.  To  allege  that  she  subjects  kings, 
emperors,  &c.,  to  her  dominion  is,  then,  to  allege  nothing  against 
her. 

The  Professor  does  not  state  the  question  properly.  He  be- 
gins with  an  assumption  which  he  has  no  right  to  make.  He  as- 
sumes, that,  if  the  Church  claims  any  authority  in  the  temporal 
order,  she  is  a  usurper,  and  therefore  cannot  be  infallible.  He 
takes  it  for  granted,  then,  that,  if  he  proves  that  she  has  claimed 
such  authority,  he  has  disproved  her  infallibility.  But  we  de- 
mand the  proof  from  reason,  that  she  has  no  authority  in  tem- 
porals. Till  he  proves  this,  he  cannot  conclude,  from  the  fact 
that  she  claims  it,  that  she  is  a  usurper,  and  therefore  fallible. 
It  is  certain  from  reason,  since  all  power  is  of  God,  and  there  is 
and  can  be  no  rightful  authority  to  govern  in  any  order  not  de- 
rived mediately  or  immediately  from  him,  that  he  can  make  the 
Pope  his  sole  vicar  on  earth  in  both  orders,  if  such  be  his  will 
and  pleasure.  If  he  does  so,  then  it  is  also  certain  iliat  the  Pope 
has  the  right  to  exercise  the  supreme  authority  in  both  orders, 
and  then  that,  so  iav  from  his  temporal  authority  being  usurped, 
all  authority  not  derived  from  God  through  him  is  usurpation. 
What  the  Professor  has  to  prove,  then,  in  case  he  contends  that 
the  Church  claims  the  supreme  temporal  authority,  is,  not  that 
she  claims  it,  but  that  she  claims  it  without  having  received  it 
from  God.  If  she  asserts  that  she  has  received  it, — since  the 
legal  presumption  is  in  her  favor,  and  the  argument  is  not  to 
prove,  but  to  disprove,  her  infallibility, — he  can  prove  that  she 
has  not  received  it  only  by  proving  that  she  has  in  the  exercise 
of  it  violated  some  principle  of  natural  justice. 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  197 

We  are  far  from  conceding  that  the  Church  has  ever  claim- 
ed or  exercised  temporal  authority  in  the  sense  intended ;  but 
pass  over  that.  Let  it  be  supposed  for  the  present  that  she 
has.  What  is  the  evidence  that  she  has  ever  violated  any  prin- 
ciple of  natural  justice  ?  You  can  arraign  her  only  on  the  law 
of  nature,  before  the  bar  of  natural  reason.  Produce,  then,  the 
precept  of  the  law  of  nature  which  she  has  violated  or  contra- 
dicted. We  have  looked  carefully  through  all  that  the  Pro- 
fessor has  urged,  and  we  can  find  nothing  that  is  immoral  or 
unjust.  All  his  proofs  are  reduced  to  this,  that  she  claims  and 
exercises  temporal  authority.  Grant  all  this,  what  then  ?  Where 
is  your  evidence  that  she  has  not  rightfully  claimed  and  exer- 
cised it  ?  You  offer  none,  and  only  work  yourself  up  into  a  vio- 
lent passion  against  her,  because  she  has  claimed  and  exercised 
it.  Where  is  your  evidence  that  the  exercise  you  fancy  you  have 
proved  has  been  contrary  to  the  law  of  nature  ?  You  offer  only 
two  things ;  first,  what  you  call  the  Jesuit's  oath,  and,  second, 
the  prohibition  of  duelling  by  the  Council  of  Trent.  The  oath 
ascribed  to  the  Jesuits  is  a  forgery.  The  Jesuits  have  no  such 
oath,  for  as  Jesuits  they  take  no  oath  at  all.  The  Council  of 
Trent  condemns  duelling,  we  grant ;  but  is  it  the  condemnation 
of  duelling,  or  duelling  itself,  that  is  contrary  io  the  precepts  of 
justice  ?  Which  is  easier  to  defend, — duelling,  or  the  Church 
in  condemninof  it  ?  And  who  is  in  the  wrono- — the  Church  in 
condemning,  or  you  in  defending,  the  base,  cowardly,  and  detest- 
able practice  of  single  combat  ? 

But  the  Church  does  more  than  condemn  it.  According  to 
the  statute  of  the  Council  of  Trent,  in  its  twenty-fifth  session, 
"  the  temporal  sovereign  who  permits  a  duel  to  take  place  in  his 
dominions  is  punished  not  only  with  excommunication,  but  with 
the  loss  of  the  place  in  which  the  combat  occurred.  The  du- 
ellists and  their  seconds  are  condemned  in  the  same  statute  to 
perpetual  infamy,  the  loss  of  their  goods,  and  deprived,  if  they 
should  fall,  of  Christian  burial,  while  those  who  are  merely  spec- 
tators of  the  scene  are  sentenced  to  eternal  malediction."  (p.  152.) 
Well,  what  then?      What  then?     Why,  this  proves  that  the 


198  THORNWELLS    ANSWER 

Churcl)  claims  the  right  to  exercise  civil  authority,  nay,  to  inflict 
ci\il  punishments;  for  such  are  the  forfeiture  of  goods,  and  the 
loss  of  the  place  wliere  the  combat  occurs.  Yes,  as  you  cite  the 
statute,  but  not  as  it  was  passed  by  the  Council  of  Trent  *  But 
let  that  pass.  If  so,  it  is  nothing  to  your  purpose,  unless  the 
punishment  prescribed  is  in  itself  unjust.  Will  you  maintain 
that  ? 

"  In  a  conflict  of  power  between  princes  and  Popes,  the  first 
and  highest  duty  of  all  the  vassals  of  Rome  is  to  maintain  her 
honor  and  support  her  claims."  (p.  153.)  Suppose  a  conflict 
of  power  between  the  General  Assembly  of  the  Presbyterian 
Church  in  the  United  States  and  the  civil  authorities  of  the 
country,  which  party  would  tlie  Professor,  as  a  Presbyterian  min- 
ister and  member  of  that  church,  support  ?  The  civil  author- 
ities ?  Then  he  either  condemns  his  church,  or  raises  the  tem- 
poral order  above  the  spiritual,  which  he  expressly  repudiates. 
Would  he  side  with  liis  church,  and  maintain  the  independence 
of  the  spiritual  order  ?  Then  he  would  recognize  and  act  on  the 
principle  he  objects  to  us,  and  we  retort  his  objection.  Suppose 
a  conflict  between  an  infallible  church  and  a  fallible  civil  govern- 
ment, we  demand  which  of  the  two  ought  to  yield.  "  But  the 
Church  is  not  infallible."  That  is  for  you  to  prove.  If  she  is 
infallible,  she  must  be  in  the  right,  and  then  we  are  bound  in 
reason  to  support  her ;  if  she  is  not  infallible,  we  deny  that  we 
are  bound  to  support  her  at  all,  for  then  she  is  not  God's  Church. 
"  Hence  the  Jesuit  in  his  secret  oath  renounces  all  allegiance 
to  all  earthly  powers  which  have  not  been  confirmed  by  the 
Holy  See."  (ib.)  The  Jesuit  has  no  secret  oath,  and  renounces 
no  allegiance  to  the  civil  government.     The  charge  is  false. 

"  The  Romish  Church,  too,  sets  her  face  like  a  flint  against 
the  subjection  of  her  spiritual  officers  to  the  legal  tribunals  of 
the  state."  {ib.)  Well,  what  if  she  does  ?  W^here  is  the  proof 
that  in  this  she  is  wrong  ?  She  "  has  positively  prohibited  the 
intolerable  presumption  of  laymen,  though  kings  and  magis- 
trates, of  demanding  oaths  of  allegiance  from  the  lofty  members 
*  Vide  Cone.  Trident.  Sess.  25,  cap.  xix. 


TO    DR.    LYXCH.  199 

oi  lier  hierarchy."  (ib.)  In  case  they  hold  nothing  temporal 
of  them,  conceded  ;  but  what  then  ?  Will  the  Professor  be  good 
enough  to  demonstrate  the  right  of  the  temporal  authority  to 
demand  from  a  minister  of  religion  an  oath  of  allegiance  in 
spirituals  ? 

La  Fayette  is  reported  to  have  said,  that,  "  if  ever  the  hber- 
ties  of  this  country  should  be  destroyed,  it  would  be  by  the 
machinations  of  the  Romish  priests."  (p.  154.)  Therefore  the 
Church  IS  fallible  !  La  Fayette  is  rejyorted,  by  whom  ?  When  ? 
Where  ?  What  if  he  did  say  so  ?  Was  La  Fayette  infallible  ? 
And  does  it  follow  that  the  thing  must  be  so,  because  La  Fayette 
thought  so  ?  If  he  did  once  think  so,  it  is  possible  that  he 
changed  his  mind,  for  it  is  reported  that  he  became  reconciled  to 
the  Church  and  died  a  Catholic,  and  it  is  well  known  that  he 
was,  when  dying,  exceedingly  anxious  for  the  services  of  a  "  Pto- 
mish  priest."  He  had  probably  had  enough  of  French  philoso- 
phism  during"  his  lifetime,  without  wishing  to  carry  any  with 
him  into  eternity. 

"  They  are  all  of  them  [  Catholic  priests]  sworn  subjects  of 
a  foreign  potentate."  (ib.)  Not  true.  The  authority  of  the 
Church  is  Catholic,  not  national,  and  can  be  no  more  foreign 
here  than  at  Rome. 

"  There  are  peculiar  principles  in  the  constitution  and  polity 
of  Rome  which  render  it  an  engine  of  tremendous  power." 
(p.  159.)  Who  has  more  power  than  God?  Because,  if  we 
admit  the  existence  of  God,  we  must  admit  his  omnipotence, 
are  we  to  be  atheists  ?  If  the  Church  be  not  God's  Church,  she 
cannot  possess  the  authority  we  claim  for  her,  without  danger, 
we  concede ;  if  she  is  his  Church,  and  the  Pope  is  his  vicar, 
what  have  we  to  fear  from  her  power  more  than  we  should  have, 
if  it  were  exerted  immediately  by  God  himself?  We  defend 
the  Church  as  God's  Church,  and  attempt  no  defence  of  her  on 
the  supposition  that  she  is  not  his  Church.  Prove  to  us  that  he 
has  not  instituted  her,  and  we  will  abandon  her ;  but  remember 
that  proving  that  she  has  a  tremendous  power  is  no  proof  to  us 
that  he  has  not  instituted  her ;  for  it  belongs  not  to  us  to  say 


200  thornwell's  answer 

how  much  or  how  little  power  it  is  proper  for  him  to  delegate  to 
her.  The  claim  of  similar  power  for  a  human  or  man-made 
church,  like  the  Presbyterian,  would  unquestionably  be  danger- 
ous, and  has  proved  itself  so  in  the  whole  history  of  Protestant- 
ism. But  that  it  is  dangerous  in  a  divinely  commissioned 
church,  we  know,  and  so  does  every  man  of  common  sense,  is 
not  and  cannot  be  true ;  for  God  himself  becomes  our  surety  for 
the  right  exercise  of  the  power,  and  that  is  sufficient. 

"  The  doctrine  of  auricular  confession  establishes  a  system  of 
espionage  which  is  absolutely  fatal  to  personal  independence, 
and  from  the  intimate  connection  between  priests  and  bishops, 
and  bishops  and  the  Pope,  all  the  important  secrets  of  the  earth 
can  be  easily  transmitted  to  the  Vatican."  This  is  ridiculously 
absurd.  No  priest  can  communicate  to  any  person  li\ing  the 
secrets  of  the  confessional,  and  he  can  no  more  do  it  to  his 
bishop  or  to  the  Pope  than  he  can  to  James  H.  Thornwell.  He 
cannot  speak,  out  of  the  confessional,  of  what  has  been  told  him 
in  the  confessional,  even  to  the  penitent  himself  No  instance 
of  the  secrets  of  the  confessional  having  been  betrayed  has  ever 
occurred.  Even  the  vilest  apostates  have  never  been  known  to 
disclose  what  they  had  received  under  the  seal  of  the  confess- 
ional. The  Catholic  clergy  do  not  record  the  confessions  of 
their  penitents  in  a  book,  making  them  a  part  of  the  records  of 
the  Church,  as  did  the  former  Puritan  ministers  of  New  Eng- 
land, as  we  had  occasion  ourselves  to  know  from  the  inspection 
of  the  records  of  some  of  their  churches,  over  which  it  was  our 
misfortune  to  be  settled  as  pastor. 

As  to  the  system  of  espionage,  we  all  know  that  it  was  car- 
ried on  to  its  perfection  in  the  Congregational  churches  of  New 
England ;  and  it  still  existed  in  full  vigor  a  few  years  ago  in  the 
Presbyterian  churches  in  the  Middle  States,  as  we  had  personal 
means  of  knowing.  In  most  Calvinistic  churches,  especially  the 
Congregational,  the  Presbyterian,  and  the  Methodist,  the  mem- 
bers are  bound  by  a  solemn  covenant,  a  covenant  frequently 
renewed,  to  watch  over  one  another,  which  means,  practically, 
that  they  shall  be  spies  one  upon  another ;  and  who  that  has 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  201 

had  the  misfortune  to  be  brought  up  a  Presbyterian  has  not 
felt  that  he  was  under  perpetual  surveillance,  that  every  member, 
it  might  be,  of  the  particular  church  to  which  he  belonged  was 
on  the  look-out  to  catch  him  tripping  ?  We  have  ourselves  had 
ample  opportunities  of  learning  the  degree  of  personal  independ- 
ence allowed  by  Presbyterianism,  and  we  never  knew  the  mean- 
ing of  personal  independence  till  we  became  a  Catholic.  There  is 
no  comparison,  in  this  matter  of  personal  independence,  between 
Catholicity  and  any  form  of  Protestantism  we  are  acquainted 
with,  and  that  is  saying  much,  if  what  is  alleged  concerning  our 
fi'e<|uent  changes  be  not  altogether  untrue.  Catholicity  provides 
us  all  the  helps  we  need  in  order  to  attain  to  Christian  perfec- 
tion ;  she  exhorts,  she  entreats  us  to  avail  ourselves  of  them, 
and  to  attain  to  that  perfection  ;  but  she  throws  the  responsi- 
bility on  our  own  individual  consciences.  Catholics,  also,  usually 
mind  their  own  business,  and  attend  rather  to  their  own  eon- 
sciences  than  to  those  of  their  neighbors.  Hence,  you  find 
among  them  very  little  hypocrisy.  Their  conduct  is  free,  frank, 
natural,  and,  as  fiir  as  we  have  had  opportunities  of  observing, 
they  generally  wear  their  worst  side  outward.  It  needs  a  close 
and  intimate  acquaintance  with  them  to  know,  or  even  to  sus- 
pect their  real  piety  and  worth.  This  indicates  any  thing  but 
the  want  of  personal  independence,  and  the  presence  of  the  sys- 
tem of  espionage  alleged.  Indeed,  the  Professor  in  bringing 
this  charge  must  have  argued  against  us  from  what' he  knows 
to  be  true  of  his  own  sect ;  but  this  is  to  pass  from  one  genus  to 
another, — not  allowable  in  logic.  Servility,  slavishness,  the  want 
of  personal  independence,  the  fear  to  say  that  our  souls  are  our 
own,  though  unquestionably  characteristics  of  the  Presbyterian, 
are  no  characteristics  of  the  Catholic.  There  is  a  total  difference 
between  the  mild  and  parental  authority  exercised  by  our  clergy 
over  us,  and  the  harsh  and  severe  tyranny  notoriously  exercised 
by  Presbyterian  ministers  over  their  flocks ;  and  it  would  take 
much  to  make  Catholics  believe  it  possible  for  a  people  to  stand 
in  such  awe  and  dread  of  a  minister  of  religion  as  Presbyterians 
do  of  their  ministers.     Our  children  are  delighted  to  see  a  priest 


202  THORNWELLS    ANS-^^ER 

come  into  the  bouse ;  we,  when   a  boy,  if  we  saw  a  minister 
coming,  used  to  rnn  and  bide  in  the  barn. 

The  Professor  has  mentioned  several  other  points,  but  they 
involve  no  principle  not  already  met  and  disposed  of.  The 
great  question  of  the  mutual  relation  of  the  temporal  and  spir- 
itual powers  we  have  not  discussed,  for  it  has  not  lain  in  our 
way.  In  these  essays  we  have  not  been  laboring  to  establish 
the  claims  of  the  Church,  but  to  test  the  validity  of  the  objec- 
tions urged  by  the  Professor.  We  have  shown  that  he  has 
offered  nothing  that  disproves,  or  tends  to  disprove,  her  infal- 
libility. This  is  all  that  was  required  of  us.  That  the  Church 
is  hostile  to  civil  government  we  deny,  and  could  easily  prove, 
if  it  were  necessary.  But  the  burden  of  proof  is  on  the  Pro- 
fessor, and  we  are  not  disposed  to  assume  it  for  ourselves.  The 
ChiJrch  represents  the  spiritual  order,  and  has  exclusive  jurisdic- 
tion under  God,  for  her  own  children,  of  all  questions  which 
pertain  to  that  order ;  but  as  the  Church,  she  has  never  enacted, 
or  attempted  to  enact,  ci\il  laws.  She  asserts,  undoubtedly, 
the  independence,  and  if  the  independence,  the  supremacy  of 
the  spiritual  order,  because  the  spiritual  order  embraces  every 
moral  question,  and  the  state  is  as  much  bound  to  obey  the 
moral  law  as  the  indi\idual ;  but  as  long  as  the  civil  govern- 
ment seeks  the  public  good  without  violating  any  precept  of 
that  law,  she  leaves  it,  within  its  own  province,  free  to  adopt 
and  carry  out  the  economical  or  prudential  policy  it  judges 
proper  or  expedient. 

The  Professor  alludes  to  the  struggles  which  have  at  times 
occurred  between  the  civil  and  ecclesiastical  powers,  and  takes 
it  for  granted  that  in  these  struggles  the  civil  power  was  always 
in  the  right,  and  the  Church  in  the  wrong.  It  is  singular  how 
i-eadily  Protestants,  when  they  wish  to  deny  the  infallibility  of 
the  Church,- assume  it  for  individuals  and  for  civil  government. 
But  civil  government  is  confessedly  fallible.  The  simple  fact  of 
a  conflict  between  the  two  powers  is,  therefore,  no  evidence  that 
the  right  is  against  the  Church.     Indeed,  the  conflict  itself  is  a 


TO    DR.    LYNCH.  203 

presumption  that  the  state  is  in  the  wrong ;  because  the  pre- 
sumption is  always  in  favor  of  the  superior  order.  Do  our  Prot- 
estant friends  ever  reflect  on  the  distrust  which  they  manifest  of 
their  o-^ti  pretended  churches,  when  they  assume  that  right 
must  needs  be,  in  every  contest,  on  the  side  of  the  temporal 
authority  ?  Do  they  remark  that  they  prove  themselves  thus 
to  be  either  courtiers  or  infidels  ?  Even  if  the  Church  were 
only  a  human  institution,  it  would  not  follow  that  she  would  not 
be  in  the  right  in  warring  against  political  tyrants.  We  certainly 
have  no  respect  for  Presbyterianism,  and  yet,  if  we  should  find 
the  state,  by  virtue  of  its  own  authority,  attempting  to  suppress 
it,  we  should  side  with  Presbyterianism  against  the  state  ;  for 
we  hold  the  utter  incompetency  of  the  state  in  spirituals,  and 
we  no  more  concede  its  right  to  sit  in  judgment  on  Presbyteri- 
anism than  we  do  its  right  to  sit  in  judgment  on  Cathohcity. 
The  question  is  one  which  belongs  to  the  spiritual  authority, 
and  the  state,  in  its  own  right,  has  and  can  have  nothing  to  do 
with  it. 

It  perhaps  has  never  occurred  to  the  Professor  that  it  might 
be  profitable  to  investigate  those  struggles  which  afiford  him  so 
much  matter  of  virulent  but  foohsh  declamation  against  the 
Church.  In  fact,  the  Popes,  in  their  contests  with  the  civil 
powers,  need  no  apology.  Judged  even  as  a  human  power,  they 
were  always  in  the  right,  on  the  side  of  justice  and  humanity, 
defending  the  cause  of  the  oppressed,  and  putting  forth  their 
power  only  to  vindicate  the  rights  of  conscience,  to  succor  the 
weak,  to  console  the  afflicted,  and  to  protect  the  friendless.  We 
said  all  this,  and  even  more,  while  yet  in  the  ranks  of  Protest- 
ants and  far  from  dreaming  that  we  should  one  day  be  a  Catho- 
lic. We  grant  that  the  Pope  has  excommunicated  princes  and 
nobles,  deposed  kings  and  emperors,  and  absolved  their  subjects 
from  their  allegiance  ;  but  in  this  he  has  only  done  his  duty  as 
the  Spiritual  Father  of  Christendom,  and  what  was  required  by 
humanity  as  well  as  religion.  These  princes  were  his  spiritual 
subjects,  amenable  to  his  authority  by  the  law  of  the  Church 
which  they  acknowledged,  and  by  the  constitution  of  their  own 


204  thornwell's  answer 

states.  He  was  their  legal  judge,  had  the  right  to  summon 
them  before  him,  and  to  cut  them  off,  if  he  saw  jjroper,  fi'om 
the  communion  of  the  faithful,  and  excommunication  of  itself 
worked  virtual  deposition.  In  absolving  subjects  from  their 
allegiance,  he  usurped  no  authority,  for  he  was  the  legal  judge 
in  the  case  ;  for  whether  the  allegiance  continued  or  had  ceased 
presented  a  case  of  conscience,  of  which,  as  Sovereign  Pontiff, 
he  had  supreme  jurisdiction,  and  because  he  was  by  all  parties 
the  acknowledged  umpire  between  princes  and  their  subjects. 
But  he  never  absolved  from  their  allegiance  the  subjects  of  infi- 
del princes,  or  of  any  princes  not  Catholic,  or  bound  to  be  Catho- 
lic by  the  constitution  of  their  states,  as  the  kings  and  queens 
of  Great  Britain  are  bound,  since  1688,  to  be  Protestant. 

But  what,  in  fact,  was  the  absolution  granted,  and  in  what 
cases  has  the  Pope  exercised,  or  claimed,  the  right  to  grant  it  ? 
Has  the  Pope  ever  claimed  the  right  to  absolve  from  their  alle- 
giance the  subjects  of  a  legitimate  prince,  who  reigns  justly, 
according  to  the  laws  and  constitution  of  his  state  ?  Never.  In 
every  such  case  he  impresses  upon  his  spiritual  children  the  duty 
of  obedience.  But  the  obligation  between  prince  and  subject  is 
reciprocal.  If  the  subject  is  bound  to  obey  the  prince,  the  prince 
is  bound  to  protect  the  subject.  This  is  implied  in  the  very 
nature  of  the  social  compact.  The  people  are  not  for  the  prince, 
but  the  prince  is  for  the  people.  The  authority  of  the  prince  is 
not  a  personal  franchise  or  right,  but  a  trust,  and  he  is  bound 
to  exercise  it  according  to  the  conditions  on  which  it  is  commit- 
ted to  him.  Government  exists,  nor  for  the  good  of  the  govern- 
ors, but  for  the  good  of  the  governed.  The  true  prince  is  the 
servant  of  his  subjects.  Government  is  instituted  for  the  com- 
mon good,  and  the  moment  it  ceases  to  consult  the  common 
good,  or  the  public  good,  it  forfeits  its  rights.  The  tyrant,  the 
oppressor,  has  and  can  have  no  right  to  reign,  and  therefore  no 
right  to  exact  obedience.  His  subjects  cease  to  be  subjects  to 
him,  and  are  free — in  a  lawful  manner— to  resist,  and  even  de- 
pose him  ;  for  resistance  to  tyrants,  if  the  manner  of  the  resist- 
ance be  iust,  is  obedience  to  God.     When  a  prince  becomes  a 


TO    DR.    L-iNCH.  205 

tyrant,  when  he  oppresses  his  subjects,  and  tramples  on  the  rights 
of  our  common  humanity,  he  breaks  the  compact  between  him 
and  his  subjects,  and  by  so  doing  releases  them  from  their  alle- 
giance.   Hence  our  Congress  of  1 Y 76  after  having  alleged  George 

the  Third  to  be  a  tyrant,  conclude, — "  Therefore these 

United  Colonies  are,  and  of  right  ought  to  be,  free  and  inde- 
pendent states  ;  and  they  are  absolved  from  all  allegiance  to  the 
British  crown."  Now  suppose  the  subjects  of  a  prince,  feeling 
themselves  aggrieved,  oppressed,  complain  to  the  Holy  Father, 
the  judge  recognized  by  both  parties  in  the  case,  that  their  prince 
has  broken  the  compact,  violated  his  oath  of  office,  and  become 
a  tyrant ;  suppose  the  Holy  Father  entertains  the  complaint,  and 
summons  both  parties  to  plead  before  him,  and,  after  a  patient 
hearing  of  the  cause,  gives  judgment  against  the  prince,  declares 
him  to  have  forfeited  his  rights,  and  that  his  subjects  are  absolv- 
ed from  their  allegiance,  what  would  there  be  in  all  this  to  which 
reason  could  object  ?  Well,  this  is  precisely  the  kind  of  abso- 
lution the  Popes  have  granted,  and  never  have  they  deposed  a 
prince  or  absolved  his  subjects,  except  in  cases  precisely  similar 
to  the  one  here  supposed.  He  merely  declares  the  law,  and 
apphes  it  to  the  facts  of  the  case  presented.  The  absolution 
itself  simply  gives  a  legal  character  to  a  fact  which  already  exists. 
The  necessity  of  some  such  authority  as  that  which  Protestants 
complain  of  in  the  Popes  is  widely  and  deeply  felt  in  modern 
society,  and  various  substitutes  for  it,  such  as  a  congress  of 
nations,  have  been  suggested  or  attempted,  but  without  any 
favorable  results.  Having  rejected  the  Pope  as  the  natural  and 
legal  umpire  between  the  prince  and  his  subjects,  we  find  our- 
selves reduced  to  the  dilemma,  either  of  passive  obedience  and 
non-resistance  to  tyrants,  or  of  revolution,  which  denies  the  right 
of  government,  renders  order  impracticable,  and  resolves  society 
into  primitive  chaos.  To  deny  the  right  to  resist  the  tyrant  is 
to  doom  the  people  to  hopeless  slavery ;  to  assert  it,  and  yet 
leave  to  each  individual  the  right  to  judge  of  the  time,  the 
means,  and  the  mode  of  resistance,  is  disorder,  no-governmentism, 
the  worst  form  of  despotism.     In  the  "  dark  ages,"  men  were 


206  thornwell's  answer 

able  to  avoid  either  alternative.  By  recognizing  the  Pope  as 
umpire,  who,  by  his  character  and  position,  as  head  of  the  Church 
•which  embraced  all  nations,  was  naturally,  not  to  say  divinely, 
fitted  to  be  impartial  and  just,  they  practically  secured  the  right 
of  resistance  to  tyranny,  without  undermining  legitimate  author- 
ity. It  will  be  long  before  modern  nations  will  be  wise  enough 
to  recognize  how  much  they  have  lost  by  what  they  call  their 
progress. 

For  ourselves,  we  thank  God  that  there  was  formerly  a  power 
on  earth  that  was  able  to  depose  tyrants,  and  to  step  in  between 
the  people  and  their  oppressors.     We  are  not  among  those  who 
are  afraid  to  glory  in  the  boldness  and  energy  of  those  great 
Popes  who  made  crowned  heads  shake,  and  princes  hold  their 
breath.     Our  heart  leaps  with  joy  when  we  see  St.  Peter  smite 
the  oppressor  of  the  Church  or  of  his  people  to  the  earth,  and 
if  we  have  ever  felt  any  regret,  it  has  been  at  the  slowness  of 
the  Holy  Father  to  smite,  or  at  his  want  of  power  to  smite  with 
more  instant  effect.     Even  when  a  Protestant,  we  learned  to 
revere  the  calumniated  Ilildebrands,  Innocents,  and  Bonifaces, 
those  noble  and  saintly  defenders  of  innocence,  protectors  of  the 
helpless,  and  humblers  of  crowned  tyrants  and  ruthless  nobles. 
0,  how  slow  even  we  Catholics  are  to  do  them  justice  !     How 
little  do  we  reflect  on  the  deep  debt  of  gratitude  we  owe  them ! 
O,  dumb  be  the  tongue  that  would  rail  against  the  Popes  or 
apologize  for  their  firm  resistance  to  the  usurpation  of  the  tem- 
poral authorities !     Alas !  how  often  in  the  history  of  modern 
Europe  have  we  seen  them,  under  God,  the  last  hope  of  the 
world,  the  only  solace  of  the  afflicted,  the  sole  resource  of  the 
WTonged  and  downtrodden !     Alas !  it  is  precisely  because  of 
their  noble  defence  of  religion  and  freedom,  of  their  fidelity  to 
God  and  to  man,  that  they  have  been  calumniated,  and  the 
world  has  been  filled  with  the  outcries  of  tyrants,  and  their 
minions  and  dupes,  against  them. 

That  the  interposition  of  the  Sovereign  Pontiffs  in  temporal 
affairs  often  occasioned  much  disturbance,  and  even  civil  wars, 
we  ai-e  not  disposed  to  deny ;  but  on  them  who  made  the  inter- 


TO    DR.    LYNCH. 


207 


position  necessary  must  rest  the  responsibility.  In  this  world, 
it  often  happens  that  right  cannot  be  peacefully  asserted  and 
maintained,  and  tyranny  proves  a  curse,  not  only  while  it  is  un- 
resisted, but  even  when  resisted,  and  successfully  resisted.  We 
cannot  permit  a  band  of  depredators  to  go  unresisted,  because 
we  must  disturb  them  by  resisting  them.  Injustice,  iniquity, 
can  never  be  redressed,  the  tyrant  can  never  be  deposed  and  the 
legitimate  sovereign  restored,  without  a  combat,  and  often  a 
loner  and  blood v  one.  Even  our  Lord  himself  told  us  to  think 
not  that  he  had  come  to  send  peace  on  the  earth,  but  a  sword 
rather.  But  shall  we,  therefore,  make  no  efforts  to  right  the 
wronged,  to  save  justice  and  humanity  from  utter  shipwreck  ? 
Let  no  man  who  glories  in  the  revolutionary  principle,  who  boasts 
of  being  a  lover  of  freedom  and  the  progress  of  mankind,  pre- 
tend it.  We  are  no  revolutionists ;  we  hold  ourselves  bound  in 
conscience  to  obey  the  legal  authority ;  but  we  acknowledge  no 
obligation  to  obey  the  oppressor,  and  let  the  competent  author- 
ity but  declare  him  an  oppressor  and  summon  us  to  the  battle- 
field, and  we  are  ready  to  obey,  to  bind  on  our  armor,  rush  in 
where  blows  fall  thickest  and  fall  heaviest,  let  the  disturbance 
be  what  it  may.  We  are,  thank  God,  Roman  Catholics,  and 
therefore  love  freedom  and  justice,  and  dare  not,  when  called 
upon,  to  shrink  from  defending  them  against  any  and  every 
enemy,  at  any  and  every  sacrifice. 

The  Professor  contends  that  the  Church  is  hostile  to  civil 
government ;  we  would  respectfully  ask  him  if  he  has  reflected, 
that,  without  her,  civil  government  becomes  impracticable.  How, 
without  her  as  umpire  between  governm.ent  and  government, 
and  betw^een  prince  and  subject,  and  without  her  as  a  spiritual 
authority  to  command  the  obedience  of  the  subject  and  the  jus- 
tice of  the  prince,  will  he  be  able  to  secure  the  independence  of 
nations,  and  wise  and  just  government  ?  Will  he  learn  from 
experience  ?  Let  him,  then,  read  modern  history.  The  age  in 
politics  discards  the  Church.  Protestantism  for  three  hundred 
years  has  been  the  religion  of  nearly  a  third,  and,  in  politics,  of 
the  whole  of  Europe.     Three  hundred  years  is  a  fair  time  for  an 


208  thornwell's  answer 

experiment.  Well,  what  is  the  result?  Despotism  on  the  one 
hand,  and  Anarchy  on  the  other.  There  is  not,  at  this  mo- 
ment, a  single  well-organized  civil  government  on  the  whole 
Eastern  continent,  and  only  our  own  on  the  Western.  The 
government  of  Great  Britain  may  seem  to  be  an  exception  for 
the  Old  World,  but  it  is  a  perfect  oligarchy ;  it  feiJs  to  secure 
the  common  weal ;  enriches  the  few  and  impoverishes  the  many ; 
and  its  very  existence  is  threatened  by  a  mob  which  the  ever- 
increasing  poverty  of  the  industrial  classes  hourly  augments,  and 
grim  want  is  rendering  desperate.  Our  own  government  is  sus- 
tained solely  by  the  accidental  advantages  of  the  country,  con- 
sisting chiefly  in  our  vast  quantities  of  unoccupied  fertile  lands, 
which  absorb  our  rapidly  increasing  population,  and  form  a  sort 
of  safety-valve  for  its  superfluous  energy.  Strip  us  of  these 
lands,  or  let  them  be  filled  up  so  that  our  expanding  population 
should  find  its  limit,  and  be  compelled  to  recoil  upon  itself,  our 
institutions  would  not  stand  a  week. 

Here  in  the  present  state  of  the  world,  hardly  to  be  paralleled 
in  universal  history, — when  old  governments  are  either  all  fallen 
or  tottering  ready  to  fall ;  when  all  authority  is  cast  oflT,  and  law 
is  despised ;  when  the  streets  of  the  most  civilized  cities  run  with 
the  blood  of  citizens  shed  by  citizens,  and  the  lurid  light  of 
burning  cottage  and  castle  gleams  on  the  midnight  sky ;  wdien 
saintly  prelates  bearing  the  olive-branch  of  peace  are  shot  down 
by  infuriated  ruffians;  when  murder  and  rapine  hardly  seek  con- 
cealment, and  all  civilization  seems  to  be  thrown  back  into  the 
savagism  of  the  forest, — here  we  may  read  the  wisdom  of  those 
who  discard  the  Church,  and  denounce  her  as  hostile  to  civil 
government, — the  wisdom  of  the  doctrine  which  a  scoffing  and 
unbelieving  age  opposes  to  the  truth  Avhich  Almighty  God  has 
revealed,  and  to  the  lessons  of  universal  experience.  Alas !  how 
true  it  is,  that  God  permits  strong  delusions  to  blind  the  impious 
and  the  licentious,  that  they  may  bring  swift  destruction  upon 
themselves ! 

But  it  is  time  to  bring  our  remarks  to  a  close.  We  have 
examined  the  principal  arguments  which  Mr.   Thornwell  has 


TO    DR     LYNCH.  .209 

brought  forward  to  prove  the  falUbility  of  the  Church,  and  we 
leave  our  readers  to  judge  for  themselves  whether  we  have  not 
proved,  that,  in  every  instance,  they  are  either  unsound  in  prin- 
ciple or  irrelevant,  pro\'ing  nothing  but  the  Professors  own  mahce 
or  ignorance.  The  Professor  has  made  numerous  assumptions, 
numerous  bold  assertions,  but  in  no  instance  has  he  done  better 
than  simply  to  assume  the  point  he  was  to  prove.  He  has  de- 
claimed loudly  against  the  Church,  he  has  said  many  hard  things  * 
against  her,  but  he  has  harmed  only  himself  and  his  brethren. 
We  now  take  our  leave  of  him.  AYe  have  done  all  we  proposed. 
"We  have  vindicated  the  Cathohc  argument  for  the  disputed  books 
drawn  from  the  infallibihty  of  the  Church,  which  is  enough, 
without  the  testimonies  of  the  Fathers,  although  we  have  even 
these.  We  regret  that  the  task  of  answering  the  Professor  had 
not  been  assumed  by  Dr.  Lynch  himself,  who  would  have  ac- 
complished it  so  much  better  than  we  have  done.  Yet  it  was 
hardly  fitting  that  he  should  have  assumed  it.  He  could  not, 
with  a  proper  respect  for  himself  and  his  profession,  have  replied 
to  such  a  vituperative  performance  as  Mr.  Thornwell's  book. 
We  were  brought  up  a  Presbyterian,  and  have  been  accustomed 
from  our  youth  to  the  sort  of  stuff  we  have  had  to  deal  with, 
and  therefore  have  been  able  to  reply  without  feeling  the 
degradation  we  should  have  felt,  had  we  all  our  lifetime  been 
accustomed  to  the  courtesy  and  candor  of  Catholic  controver- 
sialists. 


PROTESTANTISM  ENDS  IN  TRANSCENDENTALISM.* 

JULY,  1846. 

We  have  no  intention  of  reviewing  at  length  the  book  the 
title  of  which  we  have  just  quoted.  Indeed,  we  have  read  it 
only  by  proxy.     We  have  heard  it  spoken  of  in  certain  literary 

*  Margaret,  a  Tale  of  the  Real  and  Ideal,  Blight  and  Bloom,  includ- 
ing Sketches  of  a  Place  not  before  described,  called  Mons  Christi 
Boston  :  Jordan  &  Wiley.     1846.     12mo.     pp.  460. 


210  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

circles  as  a  remarkable  production,  almost  as  one  of  the  won- 
ders of  the  age.  The  Protestant  lady  who  read  it  for  us  tells 
us  that  it  is  a  weak  and  silly  book,  unnatural  in  its  scenes  and 
characters,  coarse  and  vulgar  in  its  language  and  details,  wild 
and  visionary  in  its  speculations  ;  and,  judging  from  the  portions 
here  and  there  which  we  actually  have  read,  and  from  the  source 
whence  it  emanates,  we  can  hardly  run  any  lisk  in  indorsing  our 
Protestant  friend's  criticism.  The  author  is  a  man  not  deficient 
in  natural  gifts  ;  he  has  respectable  attainments ;  and  makes,  we 
believe,  a  tolerably  successful  minister  of  the  latest  form  of  Prot- 
estantism with  which  we  chance  to  be  acquainted  ;  though, 
since  we  have  not  been  introduced  to  any  new  form  for  several 
months,  it  must  not  be  inferred  from  the  feet  that  we  are  ac- 
quainted with  no  later  form,  that  none  later  exists. 

So  far  as  we  have  ascertained  the  character  of  this  book,  it 
is  intended  to  be  the  vehicle  of  certain  crude  speculations  on  re- 
ligion, theology,  philosojjhy,  m.orals,  society,  education,  and  mat- 
ters and  things  in  general.  The  Mons  Christi  stands  for  the 
human  heart,  and  Christ  himself  is  our  higher  or  instinctive 
nature,  and  if  we  but  listen  to  our  own  natures,  we  shall  at  once 
learn,  love,  and  obey  all  that  our  Blessed  Iiodeomer  teaches. 
Hence,  Margaret,  a  poor,  neglected  child,  who  has  received  no 
instruction,  who  knows  not  even  the  name  of  her  Maker,  nor 
that  of  her  Saviour,  who,  in  fact,  has  grown  up  in  the  most  bru- 
tish ignorance,  is  represented  as  possessing  in  herself  all  the  ele- 
ments of  the  most  perfect  Christian  character,  and  as  knowing 
by  heart  nil  the  essential  principles  of  Christian  faith  and  morals. 
The  author  seems  also  to  have  written  his  work,  in  part  at  least, 
for  the  purpose  of  instructing  our  instructors  as  to  the  true 
method  of  education.  He  appears  to  adopt  a  very  simple  and 
a  very  pleasant  theory  on  the  subject, — one  which  cannot  fail  to 
commend  itself  to  our  young  folks.  Love  is  the  great  teacher ; 
and  the  true  method  of  education  is  for  the  pupil  to  fall  in  love 
with  the  tutor,  or  the  tutor  with  the  pupil,  and  it  is  perfected 
when  the  falling  in  love  is  mutual.  Wlience  it  follows,  that  it  is  a 
great  mistake  to  suppose  it  desirable  or  even  proper  that  tutor  and 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM.  211 

pupil  should  both  be  of  the  same  sex.  This  would  be  to  reverse 
the  natural  order,  since  tlie  sexes  were  evidently  intended  for 
each  other.  This  method,  we  suppose,  should  be  called  "  Learn- 
ing   MADE  EASY,  OR    NATURE  DISPLAYED,"  siuCC  it  WOuld    enable 

us  to  dispense  with  school-rooms,  prefects,  text-books,  study,  and 
the  birch,  and  to  fall  back  on  our  natural  instincts.  These  two 
points  of  doctrine  indicate  the  genus,  if  not  the  species,  of  the 
book,  and  show  that  it  must  be  classed  under  the  general  head 
of  Transcendentalism.  If  we  could  allow  ourselves  to  go  deeper 
into  the  work  and  to  dwell  longer  on  its  hcentiousness  and  blas- 
phemy, we  probably  might  determine  its  species  as  well  as  its 
yenus.  But  this  must  sufiice ;  and  when  we  add  that  the  author 
63ems  to  comprise  in  himself  several  species  at  once,  besides  the 
whole  genus  humbuggery,  we  may  dismiss  the  book,  with  sin- 
cere pity  for  him  who  wrote  it,  and  a  real  prayer  for  his  speedy 
restoi'ation  to  the  simple  genus  humanity,  and  for  his  conversion, 
through  grace,  to  that  Christianity  which  was  given  to  man  from 
above,  and  not,  spider-like,  spun  out  of  his  own  bowels. 

Yet,  bad  and  disgusting,  false  and  blasphemous,  as  this  book 
really  is,  bating  a  few  of  its  details,  it  is  a  book  which  no  Prot- 
estant, as  a  Protestant,  has  a  right  to  censure.  Many  Protest- 
ants affect  great  contempt  of  Transcendentalism,  and  horror  at 
its  extravagance  and  blasphemy ;  but  they  have  no  right  to  do 
so.  Transcendentalism  is  a  much  more  serious  affiur  than  they 
would  have  us  believe.  It  is  not  a  simple  "  Yankee  notion,"  con- 
fined to  a  few  isolated  individuals  in  a  little  corner  of  New  Eng- 
land, as  some  of  our  Southern  friends  imagine,  but  is  in  fact  the 
dominant  error  of  our  times,  is  as  life  in  one  section  of  our  com- 
mon country  as  in  another;  and,  in  principle,  at  least,  is  to  be 
met  with  in  every  popular  Anti-Catholic  writer  of  the  day, 
whether  German,  French,  English,  or  American.  It  is,  and  has 
been  from  the  first,  the  fundamental  heresy  of  the  whole  Prot- 
estant world ;  for,  at  bottom,  it  is  nothing  but  the  fundamental 
principle  of  the  Protestant  Reformation  itself,  and  without  as- 
suming it,  there  is  no  conceivable  principle  on  which  it  is  possi- 
ble to  justify  the  Reformers  in  their  separation  from  the  Catholic 


212  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

Church.  The  Protestant  who  refuses  to  accept  it,  with  all  its 
legitimate  consequences,  however  friglitful  or  absurd  they  may 
be,  condemns  himself  and  his  whole  party. 

We  are  far  from  denying  that  many  Protestants,  and,  indeed, 
the  larger  part  of  them,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  profess  to  hold  many 
doctrines  which  are  incompatible  with  Transcendentalism ;  but 
this  avails  them  nothing,  for  they  hold  them,  not  as  Protestants, 
but  in  despite  of  their  Protestantism,  and  therefore  have  no  right 
to  hold  them  at  all.  In  taking  an  account  of  Protestantism,  we 
have  the  right,  and,  indeed,  are  bound,  to  exclude  them  from  its 
definition.  Every  man  is  bound,  as  the  condition  of  being  ranked 
among  rational  beings,  to  be  logically  consistent  with  himself; 
and  no  one  can  claim  as  his  own  any  doctrine  which  does  not 
flow  from,  or  which  is  not  logically  consistent  with,  his  own  first 
principles.  This  follows  necessarily  from  the  principle,  that  of 
contradictoj-ies  one  must  be  false,  since  one  necessarily  excludes 
the  other.  If,  then,  the  doctrines  incompatible  with  Transcend- 
entalism, which  Protestants  profess  to  hold,  do  not  flow  from  their 
own  first  principles,  or  if  they  are  not  logically  compatible  with 
them,  they  cannot  claim  them  as  Protestants,  and  we  have  the 
rio-ht,  anS  are  bound  to  exclude  them  from  the  definition  of 
Protestantism.  The  man  cannot  be  scientifically  included  in  the 
definition  of  the  horse,  because  both  chance  to  be  lodged  in  the 
same  stable,  or  to  be  otherwise  found  in  juxtaposition. 

The  essential  mark  or  characteristic  of  Protestantism  is,  un- 
questionably, dissent  from  the  authority  of  the  Catholic  Church, 
in  subjection  to  which  the  first  Protestants  were  spiritually  born 
and  reared.  This  is  evident  from  the  whole  history  of  its  origin, 
and  from  the  well  known  ft^ct,  that  opposition  to  Catholicity  is 
the  only  point  on  which  all  who  are  called  Protestants  can  agree 
among  themselves.  On  every  other  question  which  comes  up, 
they  diflfer  widely  one  from  another,  and  not  unfrequently  some 
take  views  directly  opposed  to  those  taken  by  others ;  but  when 
it  concerns  opposing  the  Church,  however  dissimilar  their  doc- 
trines and  tempers,  they  all  unite,  and  are  ready  to  march  as  one 
man  to  the  attack.     As  dissent.  Protestantism  is  negative,  denies 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM.  213 

the  authority  of  the  Cathohc  Church,  and  can  include  within  its 
definition  nothing  which,  even  in  the  remotest  sense,  concedes  or 
imphes  that  authority.  But  no  man,  sect,  or  party  can  rest  on 
a  mere  negation,  for  no  mere  negation  is  or  can  be  an  ultimate 
principle.  Every  negation  implies  an  affirmation,  and  therefore 
an  affirmative  principle  which  authorizes  it.  He  who  dissents 
does  so  in  obedience  to  some  authority  or  principle  which  com- 
mands or  requires  him  to  dissent,  and  this  principle,  not  the  ne- 
gation, is  his  fundamental  principle.  The  essential  or  funda- 
mental principle  of  Protestantism  is,  then,  not  dissent  from  the 
authority  of  the  Catholic  Church,  but  the  affirmative  principle 
on  which  it  relies  for  the  justification  of  its  dissent. 

What,  then,  is  this  affirmative  principle  ?  Whatever  it  be,  it 
must  be  either  out  of  the  individual  dissenting,  or  in  him ;  that 
Is,  some  external  authority,  or  some  internal  authority.  The 
fii-st  supposition  is  not  admissible ;  for  Protestants  really  allege 
no  authority  for  dissent,  external  to  the  individual  dissenting, — 
have  never  defined  any  such  authority,  never  hinted  that  such 
authority  exists  or  is  needed  ;  and  there  obviously  is  no  such  au- 
thority which  can  be  adduced.  In  point  of  fact,  so  far  from  dis- 
senting from  the  Church  on  the  ground  that  they  are  commanded 
to  do  so  by  an  external  authority  paramount  to  the  Church,  they 
deny  the  existence  of  all  external  authority  in  matters  of  faith, 
and  defend  their  dissent  on  the  ground  that  there  is  no  such 
authority,  never  was,  and  never  can  be* 

But  some  may  contend,  judging  from  the  practice  of  Protest- 
ants, and  what  we  know  of  the  actual  facts  of  the  original  estab- 
lishment of  Protestantism  in  all  those  countries  in  which  it  has 
become  predominant,  that  it  does  recognize  an  exteraal  author- 
ity, which  it  holds  paramount  to  the  Church,  and  on  which  it 
relies  for  its  justification.  Protestantism,  as  a  matter  of  foct, 
owes  its  estabhshment  to  the  authority  of  the  lay  lords  and  tem- 
poral princes,  or,  in  a  general  sense,  to  the  civil  authority.  It 
was,  originally,  much  more  of  a  political  revolt  than  of  a  strictly 
religious  dissent,  and  its  external  causes  must  be  sought  in  the 
ambition  of  princes,  dating  back  from  Louis  of  Bavaria,  and  in- 


214  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

eluding  Louis  the  Twelfth  of  France,  rather  than  in  any  real 
change  of  taith  operated  in  the  masses  ;  and  its  way  was  prepared 
by  the  temper  of  mind  which  the  temporal  princes  created  in 
their  subjects  by  the  wars  they  undertook  and  carried  on  osten- 
sibly against  the  popes  as  political  sovereigns,  but  really  for  the 
purpose  of  possessing  the  patrimony  of  the  Church,  and  of 
subjecting  the  Church,  in  their  respective  dominions,  to  the 
control  of  the  secular  power.  The  Reformers  would  have  ac- 
complished little  or  nothing,  if  politics  had  not  come  to  their 
aid.  Luther  would  have  bellowed  in  vain,  had  he  not  been 
backed  by  the  powerful  Elector  of  Saxony,  and  immediately 
aided  by  the  Landgrave  Philip;  Zwingle,  and  (Ecolampa- 
dius,  and  Calvin  would  have  accomplished  nothing  in  Swit- 
zerland, if  they  had  not  secured  the  aid  of  the  secular  arm,  and 
followed  its  wishes ;  the  powerful  Huguenot  party  in  France 
was  more  of  a  political  than  of  a  religious  party,  and  it  dwind- 
led into  insignificance  as  soon  as  it  lost  the  support  of  great 
lords,  distinguished  statesmen  and  lawyers,  and  provincial  par- 
liaments. Li  Denmark,  Sweden,  and  Norway,  the  Reform  was 
purely  the  act  of  the  civil  power ;  in  the  United  Provinces,  it 
was  embraced  as  the  principle  of  revolt,  or  of  national  independ- 
ence ;  in  England,  it  was  the  work,  confessedly,  of  the  secular 
government  and  was  carried  by  court  an.d  parliament  against 
the  wishes  of  the  immense  majority  of  the  nation  ;  in  Scotland, 
it  was  effected  by  the  great  lords,  who  wished  to  usurp  to  them- 
selves the  authority  of  the  crown  ;  in  this  country,  it  came  in 
with  the  civil  government,  and  was  maintained  by  civil  enact- 
ments, pains,  and  penalties.  We  might,  therefore,  be  led,  at 
first  sight,  to  assert  the  fundamental  principle  of  Protestantism 
to  be  the  supremacy  in  spirituals  of  the  civil  power.  But  this 
would  be  a  mistake,  because  it  did  not  recognize  this  supremacy 
unless  the  civil  power  was  Anti-Catholic,  and  because  the  asser- 
tion of  this  supremacy  of  the  civil  power  in  spirituals  was  itself 
a  denial  of  the  authority  of  the  Church,  and  therefore  could 
not  be  made  without  making  the  act  of  dissent.  There  is  no 
question  but  the  Protestants  did,  whenever  it  suited  their  pur- 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM.  215 

pose,  assert  the  supremacy  of  the  state  in  spiritual  mattei-s ;  and 
it  must  be  conceded  that  it  is  very  agreeable  to  its  nature  to  do 
so,  as  is  evident  from  the  fact,  that  even  now,  and  in  this  conn- 
try,  it  opposes  the  Catholic  Church  chiefly,  and  with  the  most 
success,  on  the  ground  that  Catholicity  j\sserts  the  freedom  of 
religion,  or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  the  independence  of  the 
spiritual  authority.  Still  this  cannot  be  its  ultimate  principle. 
The  Church  taught  and  teaches,  that,  though  the  independence 
of  the  civil  power  in  matters  purely  temporal  is  asserted,  its  au- 
thority in  spirituals  is  null.  To  deny  this  is  to  deny  the  Church, 
and  as  much  to  dissent  from  her  authority  as  to  deny  her  infalli- 
bility, her  divine  authority,  or  any  article  of  the  creed  she  teaches ; 
and  this  must  be  denied  before  the  supremacy  of  the  civil  power 
in  spirituals  can  be  asserted.  Therefore,  if  Protestantism  did 
openly,  avowedly,  assert  the  Erastian  heresy  of  the  supremacy 
of  the  civil  power  in  spirituals,  it  would  not  justify  her  dissent 
by  an  external  authority,  unless  she  could  make  this  assertion 
itself  on  some  external  authority  acknowledged  to  be  paramount 
to  the  Church.  But  for  this  she  has  no  extei-nal  authority,  since 
the  Church  denies  it,  and  the  authority  of*  the  state  is  the  mat- 
ter in  question.  She  can,  then,  assert  the  supremacy  of  the 
state  only  on  the  authority  of  some  principle  in  the  individual 
dissenting,  and  therefore  only  on  some  internal  authority. 
Whatever  authority,  then,  Protestentisni  may  ascribe  to  the 
civil  power,  it  is  not  an  external  authority,  because  the  authority 
asserted  is  ahvays  cf  the  same  order  as  that  on  which  it  is  assert- 
ed, and  can  never  transcend  it. 

Others,  again,  may  think,  since  Protestants,  and  especially 
those  among  them  denominated  Anglicans  and  Episcopahans, 
occasionally  appeal  to  Christian  antiquity  and  talk  of  the  Fa- 
thers, and  sometimes  even  profess  to  quote  them,  that  they  have, 
or  think  they  have,  in  Christian  antiquity  an  authority  for  dis- 
sent, virtually,  at  least  external  to  the  individual  dissenting.  But 
Christian  antiquity,  unless  read  with  a  presumption  in  favor  of 
the  Church,  save  on  a  few  general  and  public  facts  manifestly 
ao-ainst  Protestants,  decides  nothing.     Understood  as  the  Church 


216  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

understands  it,  and  it  e\ddently  may,  without  violence  to  its  let- 
ter or  spirit,  be  so  understood,  it  condemns  Protestantism  with- 
out mercy.  To  make  it  favor  Protestantism  even  negatively,  it 
is  necessary  to  resort  to  a  principle  of  interpretation  which  the 
Church  does  not  concede,  and  the  adoption  of  which  would, 
therefore,  involve  the  dissent  in  question.  If  we  take  with  us 
the  canon,  that  all  the  Christian  Fathers  are  to  be  vmderstood  in 
accordance  with  the  Church  when  not  manifestly  against  her, 
Christian  antiquity  will  be  all  on  the  side  of  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic Church ;  if  we  take  the  canon,  that  all  in  the  Christian 
Fathers  is  to  be  understood  in  a  sense  against  the  Church,  when 
not  manifestly  in  her  favor,  Christian  antiquity  may,  on  some 
important  dogmas,  leave  the  question  doubtful ;  though  even 
then  it  would,  in  foct,  be  decisive  for  the  authority  of  the  Church, 
and  therefore  implicitly  for  all  special  dogmas.  But,  be  this  as 
it  may,  it  is  undeniable  that  it  is  only  by  adopting  this  latter 
canon  that  Protestantism  can  derive  any  countenance  from  Chris- 
tian antiquity.  But  on  what  authority  do  they,  or  can  they,  adopt 
such  a  canon  ?  Protestants  call  themselvos  reformers ;  they  are 
accusers,  dissenters,  and  therefore  all  the  presumptions  in  the 
case  are  manifestly  against  them,  as  they  are  against  all  who 
accuse,  bring  an  action  or  a  charge  against  others ;  and  they 
must  make  out  a  strong  prima  facie  case,  before  they  can  turn 
the  presumptions  in  their  ftivor.  This  is  law,  and  it  is  justice. 
Till  they  do  this,  the  presumption  is  in  favor  of  the  Church  ; 
and  then  it  is  enough  for  her  to  show  that  the  testimony  of  an- 
tiquity 77iai/,  without  violence,  be  so  understood  as  not  to  im- 
peach her  claims.  Till  then,  nothing  will  make  for  Protestants 
which  is  not  manifestly  against  her,  so  clear  and  express  as  by 
no  allowable  latitude  of  interpretation  to  be  reconcilable  with 
her  pretentions.  That  is  to  say,  the  Protestant  must  impeach 
the  Church  on  prima  facie  evidence,  before  he  can  have  the 
right  to  adopt  that  canon  of  interpretation  without  which  it  is 
manifestly  suicidal  for  him  to  appeal  to  Christian  antiquity. 
Take,  as  an. illustration  of  what  we  mean,  the  testimony  of  St. 
Justin  Martyr  to  the  Catholic  doctrine  of  the  Real  Presence.     It 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM. 


217 


is  clear  to  any  one  vrlio  reads  tlie  p^tssage,  that  the  words  in  a 
plain  and  easy  sense  confirm  the  Catholic  doctrine  ;  and  yet,  if 
there  were  an  urgent  necessity  for  interpreting  them  otherwise, 
we  are  not  certain  but,  without  greater  deviation  from  the  literal 
sense  than  is  sometimes  allowed,  they  might  be  so  understood 
as  not  to  be  inconsistent  with  the  views  of  the  Blessed  Eucharist 
which  some  Protestant  sects  profess  to  entertain.  But  by  what 
authority,  because  they  maij  be  so  interpreted,  are  we  to  say 
they  must  be  ?  In  truth,  it  is  nothing  to  the  Protestant's  pur- 
pose to  say  they  may  be,  till  he  establishes  by  positive  authority 
they  must  be,  for  it  is  obvious  they  also  may  not  be.  Now, 
what  and  where  Is  this  positive  authority  ?  Manifestly  not  in 
Christian  antiquity  itself;  and  yet  it  must  be  had,  before  Chris- 
tian antiquity  can  be  adduced  as  authorizing  dissent  from  the 
Catholic  Church.  This  authority,  as  we  said  before,  must  be 
either  external  to  the  dissenter  or  internal  in  the  dissenter  him- 
self. It  cannot  be  external ;  for,  after  the  Church,  there  is  no 
conceivable  external  authority  applicable  in  the  case.  It  must, 
then,  be  internal.  Then  the  authority  of  Christian  antiquity,  as 
alleged  against  the  Church,  is  only  the  authority  there  is  in  the 
dissenter  himself,  according  to  the  principle  already  established, 
that  the  authority  asserted  is  necessarily  of  the  same  order  as 
that  on  which  it  is  asserted. 

Finally,  it  will,  perhaps,  be  alleged,  inasmuch  as  all  Protest- 
ants did  at  first,  and  some  of  them  do  now,  appeal  to  the  written 
word,  or  the  Holy  Scriptures,  in  justification  of  their  dissent, 
that  they  have  in  these  a  real  or  a  pretended  authority,  external 
to  and  independent  of  the  dissenter,  distinct  from  and  paramount 
to  that  of  the  Church.  But  a  moment's  reflection  will  show, 
even  if  the  Scriptures  were  not  in  favor  of  the  Church,  that  this 
is  a  mistake.  The  Holy  Scriptures  proposed,  and  their  sense 
declared,  by  the  Church,  we  hold  with  a  firm  faith  to  be  the 
word  of  God,  and  therefore  of  the  highest  authority ;  but,  if  not 
so  proposed  and  interpreted,  though  in  many  respects  important 
and  authentic  historical  documents,  and  valuable  for  their  excel- 
lent didactic  teachings,  they  would  not  and  could  not  be  for  us 


218  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

the  inspired,  and,  in  a  supernatural  sense,  the  authoritative, 
word  of  God.  To  the  Protestant  they  are  not  and  cannot  be  an 
authority  external  to  the  dissenter;  because,  denying  the  un- 
written word,  the  Church,  and  all  authoritative  tradition,  he  has 
no  external  authority  to  vouch  for  the  fact  that  they  are  the  in- 
spired word  of  God,  or  to  declare  their  genuine  sense.  If  there 
be  no  external  authority  to  decide  that  the  Bible  is  the  word  of 
God,  and  to  declare  its  true  sense,  the  authority  ascribed  to  it  in 
the  last  analysis,  according  to  the  principle  we  have  established, 
is  only  the  authority  of  some  internal  principle  in  the  individual 
dissenting;  for,  in  that  case,  the  individual,  by  virtue  of  this  in- 
ternal principle,  decides,  with  the  Bible  as  without  it,  what  is 
and  what  is  not  God's  word,  what  God  has  and  has  not  revealed  ; 
and  therefore  what  he  is  and  what  he  is  not  bound  to  believe, 
what  he  is  and  what  he  is  not  bound  to  do. 

It  is,  moreover,  notorious  that  l^rotestants  do  really  deny  all 
external  authority  in  matters  of  faith,  and  hold  that  any  external 
authority  to  determine  for  the  individual  what  he  must  believe 
would  be  manifest  usurpation,  intolerable  tyranny,  to  be  resisted 
by  every  one  who  has  any  sense  of  Christian  freedom,  or  of  his 
rights  and  dignity  as  a  man.  Even  the  Anglican  Church,  which 
claims  to  herself  authority  in  controversies  of  faith,  acknowledges 
that  she  has  no  right  to  ordain  any  thing  as  of  necessity  to  sal- 
vation, whicli  may  not  be  proved  from  God's  word  written ;  and 
by  implication  at  least,  if  she  means  any  thing,  leaves  it  to  the 
individual  to  determine  for  himself  whether  what  she  ordains  is 
provable  from  the  written  word  or  not ;  and,  therefore,  abandons 
her  own  authority,  by  making  the  individual  the  judge  of  its 
legality.  No  one  will,  furthermore,  pretend  that  Protestants 
even  affect  to  have  dissented  from  the  Catholic  Church,  in  which 
they  were  spiritually  born  and  reared,  in  obedience  to  an  exter- 
nal authority ;  that  is  to  say,  another  Church,  which  they  held 
to  be  paramount  to  the  Roman  Catholic  Church.  If  they  had 
admitted  that  there  was  anywhere  an  authoritative  Church,  tliey 
would  have  agreed  that  it  was  this  Church,  and  could  liave  been 
no  other.     In  denying  the  authority  of  the  Roman  Catholic 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM.  219 

Church,  they  denied,  and  intended  to  deny,  in  principle,  all  ex- 
ternal authority  in  matters  of  faith ;  and  the  chief  count  in  the 
indictment  of  the  Church,  which  they  have  drawn  up,  and  on 
which  they  have  been  for  these  three  hundred  years  demanding 
conviction,  is,  that  she  claims  to  be  such  authority,  when  no  such 
authority  was  instituted,  or  intended  to  be  instituted.  We  may, 
then,  safely  conclude  that  the  affirmative  principle  on  which 
Protestantism  relies  for  the  justification  of  its  denial  of  Catholic 
authority  is  not  some  authority  external  to  the  individual  dis- 
senting, and  held  to  be  paramount  to  that  from  which  he  dis- 
sents. 

Then  the  principle  must  be  internal  in  the  individual  himself 
and  this  is  precisely  what  Protestantism  teaches  ;  for  by  her  own 
confession,  nay,  by  her  own  boast,  her  fundamental  principle  is, 
PRIVATE  JUDGMENT.  This  was  the  only  principle  which,  in  the 
nature  of  the  case,  she  could  set  up  as  the  antagonist  of  Catholic 
authority ;  and  it  is  notorious  the  world  over,  that  it  is  in  the 
name  of  this  principle  that  she  arraigns  the  Church,  and  com- 
mands her  to  give  an  account  of  hereelf.  We  see,  even  to-day, 
emblazoned  on  the  banners  borne  by  the  motley  hosts  of  the  so- 
called  "Christian  Alliance,"  this  glorious  device, — The  Right 
OF  Private  Judgment.  This  is  their  battle-cry,  as  Deus  Vult 
was  that  of  the  Crusaders.  It  is  their  In  hoc  sir/no  vince.  "  We 
want  no  inftillible  pope,  bishops,  or  church,  to  propound  and  ex- 
plain to  us  God's  word,  to  lord  it  over  God's  heritage,  and  make 
slaves  of  our  very  consciences.  ISTo !  we  are  freemen,  and  we 
strike  for  freedom,  the  glorious  birthright  of  every  Christian  to 
judge  for  himself  what  is  or  what  is  not  the  word  of  God ;  that 
is,  what  he  is  or  is  not  to  believe."  There  is  no  mistake  in  this. 
If  there  is  any  thing  essential,  any  thing  fundamental,  in  Pro- 
testantism, any  thing  which  makes  it  the  subject  of  a  predicate 
at  all  it  is  this  far-famed  and  loud-boasted  principle  of  private 
judgment. 

In  saying  this,  we  of  course  are  not  to  be  understood  as  as- 
serting that  Protestants  always,  or  even  commonly,  respect,  in 
their  practice,  this  right  of  private  judgment.     Practically,  every 


220  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

Protestant  sa}^s,  "  /  have  the  right  to  think  as  I  please,  and  you 
have  the  right  to  think  as  I  do ;  and  if  you  do  not,  I  will,  if  I 
have  the  power,  compel  you  to  do  so,  or  confiscate  your  goods, 
deprive  you  of  citizenship,  outlaw  you,  behead,  hang,  or  burn 
you;  at  least,  imprison  you,  flog  you,  or  bore  your  ears  and 
tongue."  In  point  of  fact,  Protestants,  we  grant,  have  very  gen- 
erally violated  the  principle  of  private  judgment,  and  have  prac- 
tised, in  the  name  of  religious  liberty,  the  most  unjust,  tyranny 
over  conscience, — unjust,  because,  on  their  own  principles,  they 
have  received  from  Almighty  God  no  authority  to  dictate  to 
conscience,  and  because  they  also  concede,  what  is  unquestion- 
ably true,  that  conscience  is  accountable  to  God  alone.  Every 
attempt  of  any  man,  set,  or  class  of  men,  not  expressly  commis- 
sioned by  Almighty  God, — so  expressly  that  the  authority  exer- 
cised shall  be  really  and  truly  his, — to  exert  the  least  control 
over  conscience  is  a  manifest  usurpation,  an  outrageous  tyranny, 
which  every  man,  having  a  just  reverence  for  his  Maker,  will 
resist  even  unto  death.  The  Catholic  Church,  indeed,  claims 
plenary  authority  over  conscience ;  but  only  on  the  ground,  that 
she  is  divinely  commissioned,  and  that  the  authority  which  speaks 
in  her  is  literally  and  as  truly  the  authority  of  God,  as  that  of 
the  representative  is  that  of  his  sovereign.  If  per  impossihile, 
she  could  suppose  herself  not  to  be  so  commissioned,  and  there- 
fore not  having  the  pledge  of  the  divine  supervision,  protection, 
and  aid  which  such  commission  necessarily  implies,  she  would 
concede  that  she  has  no  authority,  and  should  attempt  to  exer- 
cise none.  AVe  cheerfully  obey  her,  because  in  obeying  her  we 
are  obeying  not  a  human  authority,  but  God  himself.  In  sub- 
mitting to  her  we  are  free,  because  we  are  submitting  to  God, 
who  is  our  rightful  sovereign,  to  whom  we  belong,  all  that  we 
have,  and  all  that  we  are.  Freedom  is  not  in  being  held  to  no 
obedience,  but  in  being  held  to  obey  only  the  legal  sovereign ; 
and  the  more  unqualified  this  obedience,  the  freer  we  are.  Per- 
fect freedom  is  in  having  no  will  of  our  own,  in  willing  only 
what  our  sovereign  wills,  and  because  he  wills  it.  If  the  Church, 
as  we  cannot  doubt,  be  really  commissioned  by  God,  the  more 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM.  221 

absolute  lier  authority,  tlie  more  unqualified  our  submission,  the 
more  perfect  is  our  liberty,  as  every  man  knows,  who  knows  any 
thing*  at  all  of  that  freedom  wherewith  the  Son  makes  us  free. 
But  in  yielding  obedience  to  a  Protestant  sect,  it  is  not  the  same. 
When  any  one  of  our  sects  undertakes  to  dictate  to  conscience, 
it  is  tyranny ;  because,  by  its  own  confession,  it  has  received  no 
authority  from  God.  It  is  tyranny,  even  though  what  it  attempts 
to  enforce  be  really  God's  word ;  for  it  attempts  to  enforce  it  by 
a  human,  and  not  by  a  divine  authority.  It  would  still  tyran- 
nize, because  it  has  no  right  to  enforce  any  thing  at  all.  It  may 
say,  as  our  sects  do  say,  it  has  the  Bible,  that  the  Bible  is  God's 
word,  and  that  it  only  exacts  the  obedience  to  God's  com- 
mands which  no  man  has  the  right  to  withhold.  Be  it  so.  But 
who  has  made  it  the  keeper  and  executor  of  God's  laws  ?  Where 
is  its  commission  under  the  hand  and  seal  of  the  Almighty  ? 
It  is,  doubtless,  right  that  the  civil  law  should  be  executed, — 
that  the  murderer,  for  instance,  should  be  punished ;  but  it  does 
not  therefore  follow  that  I,  as  a  simple  citizen,  have  the  right  to 
execute  them,  and  to  inflict  the  punishment.  That  may  be  done 
only  by  the  constituted  authorities,  and  is  not  my  business ;  and 
it  is  a  sound  as  well  as  a  homely  adage.  Let  every  one  mind  his 
own  business.  Protestants,  on  this  point,  fall  into  grievous 
errors.  The  simple  possession  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  does  not 
constitute  them  keepers  of  the  word, — even  supposing  the  Scrip 
tures  to  contain  the  whole  word, — and  give  them  the  right  to 
dictate  to  conscience,  as  they  imagine,  any  more  than  the  fact  of 
my  having  in  my  possession  the  statute-book  constitutes  me  the 
guardian  and  administrator  of  the  laws  of  the  commonwealth. 
Protestants,  whenever  they  interfere  with  the  right  of  private 
judgment,  convict  themselves,  on  their  own  principles,  of  practis- 
ing on  what,  in  these  days,  is  called  "Lynch  law;"  and  Lynch 
law  is  to  the  state  precisely  what  Protestantism,  in  practice,  is  to 
the  Church. — This  is  a  fact  v>'hich  deserves  the  grave  consider- 
ation of  those  sects  which  contend  for  creeds  and  confessions,  and 
claim  the  right  to  try  and  punish  as  heretics  such  as  in  their 
judgment  do  not  conform  to  them.     Even  Dr.  Beecher  himself 


222  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

came  very  near,  a  few  years  since,  being  lynched  by  his  Presby- 
terian associates ;  and  if  it  bad  not  been  for  an  extraordinary 
suppleness  and  marvellous  skill  in  parrying  blows,  hardly  to  have 
been  expected  in  one  of  his  age,  it  might  have  been  all  np  with 
him.  Our  Presbyterian,  Dutch  Reformed,  Puritan,  and  Angli- 
can friends  should  lay  this  to  heart,  and  never  suffer  themselves 
to  complain  of  the  practice  of  "  Lynch  law,"  or  to  find  the  least 
fault  with  the  commission  of  Judge  Lynch  himself, — for  it 
emanates  from  the  same  authority  as  their  own,  and  is  as  regu- 
larly made  out  and  authenticated.  But  this  is  foreign  from  our 
present  purpose.  It  is  enough  for  our  present  purpose,  that 
Protestants  assert,  in  theory,  as  they  un(]uestionably  do,  the  right 
of  i)rivate  judgment,  and  make  it  the  principle  of  their  dissent 
from  the  authority  of,  the  Catholic  Church. 

But  all  men,  at  least  as  to  their  inherent  rights,  are  equal. 
The  right  of  private  judgment,  then,  cannot  be  asserted  for  one 
man,  without  being  at  the  same  time,  and  by  the  same  author- 
ity, asserted  for  all  men.  Then  Protestants  cannot  assert  pri- 
vate judgment  as  their  authority  for  dissenting  from  the  Catho- 
lic Church,  without  erecting  it  into  a  universal  principle.  We 
may  assume,  then,  that  Protestantism  begins  by  laying  down  as 
its  principle  the  right  of  all  men  to  private  judgment. 

But  the  right  of  all  men  to  private  judgment  is  in  effect  the 
unrestricted  or  univei-sal  right  to  private  judgment.  This  may 
not  have  been  clearly  seen  in  the  beginning,  and  there  is  no 
question  but  Protestants  intended  in  the  commencement  to  re- 
strict the  right  of  private  judgment  to  the  simple  interpretation 
of  the  written  word.  But  every  one,  whatever  may  be  his  in- 
tentions, must  be  held  answerable  for  the  strict  logical  conse- 
quences of  the  principles  he  deliberately  adopts  ;  for  if  he  does 
not  foresee  these  consequences,  he  ought  not  to  take  upon  him- 
self the  responsibility  of  adopting  the  principles.  The  right  of 
private  judgment,  once  admitted,  can  no  longer  be  restricted.  If 
restricted  at  all,  it  must  be  by  some  authority,  and  this  author- 
ity must  be  either  external  or  internal.  If  internal,  it  is  private 
judgment  itself,  and  then  it  cannot  restrict,  for  it  would  be  ab- 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM.  223 

suid  to  say  that  private  judgment  can  restrict  private  judgment. 
It  cannot  be  an  external  authority,  because  Protestants  admit 
no  exiernal  authority,  and  because  we  cannot  assert  an  exter- 
nal authority  to  restrict  private  judgment,  without  denying 
private  judgment  itself.  Either  the  authority  must  prescribe  the 
limits  of  private  judgment,  or  private  judgment  must  prescribe 
the  limits  of  the  restriction  ;  if  the  first,  it  is  tantamount  to  the 
denial  of  private  judgement  itself,  for  private  judgment  would 
then  subsist  only  at  the  mercy  of  authority,  by  sufferance,  and 
not  by  right ;  if  the  latter,  the  authority  is  null ;  for  private 
judgment  may  enlarge  or  contract  the  restriction  as  it  pleases, 
and  that  is  evidently  no  restriction  which  is  only  what  that 
which  is  restricted  chooses  to  make  it.  It  is  impossible,  then, 
to  erect  private  judgment  into  a  principle  for  all  men,  and  after- 
wards to  restrict  it  to  the  simple  interpretation  of  the  Holy 
Scriptures. 

If  we  assert  the  right  of  private  judgment  to  interpret  the 
Holy  Scriptures,  we  must  assert  its  right  in  all  cases  whatsoever ; 
for  the  principle  on  which  private  judgment  can  be  defended  in 
one  case  is  equally  applicable  in  every  case.  Will  it  be  said 
that  private  judgment  must  yield  to  God's  word  ?  Granted. 
But  what  is  God's  word  ?  The  Bible.  How  know  you  that  ? 
Do  you  determine  that  the  Bible  is  the  word  of  God  by  some 
external  authority,  or  by  private  judgment  ?  Not  by  some  ex- 
ternal authority,  because  you  have  none,  and  admit  none.  By 
private  judgment  ?  Then  the  authority  of  the  Bible  is  for  you 
only  private  judgment.  The  Bible  does  not  propose  itself,  and 
therefore  can  have  no  authority  higher  than  the  authority  which 
proposes  it.  Here  is  a  serious  difficulty  for  those  Protestants 
who  set  up  such  a  clamor  about  the  Bible,  and  which  shows 
them,  or  ought  to  show  them,  that,  whatever  the  Bible  may  be 
for  a  Catholic,  for  them  it  can,  in  no  conceivable  contingency,  be 
any  thing  but  a  human  authority.  The  authority  of  that 
which  is  projyosed  is  of  the  same  order  as  that  which  proposes, 
and  cannot  transcend  it.  This  is  a  Protestant  argument,  and 
is   substantially  the  great  argument  of  ChilUngworth  agains\. 


224  PROTESTANTISxM    ENDS 

Catholicity.  Nothing  proposes  the  Bible  to  Protestants  but 
private  judgment,  as  is  evident  from  their  denial  of  all  other  au- 
thority ;  and  therefore  in  the  Bible  they — not  we,  thank  God  ! 
— have  only  the  authority  of  private  judgment,  and  therefore 
only  the  word  of  man,  and  not  the  word  of  God.  If  the  au- 
thority on  which  Protestants  receive  the  word  of  God  is  only 
that  of  private  judgement,  then  there  is  for  them  in  the  Bible 
only  private  judgment ;  and  then  nothing  to  restrict  private 
judgment,  for  private  judgment  can  itself  be  no  restriction  on 
private  judgment. 

Moreover,  if  we  take  the  Bible  to  be  the  word  of  God  on  the 
authority  of  private  judgment,  and  its  sense  on  the  same  author- 
ity, as  Protestants  do  and  must,  then  we  assume  private  judg- 
ment to  be  competent  to  decide  of  itself  what  is  and  what  is  not 
the  word  of  God,  what  God  has  revealed  and  what  he  has  not 
revealed,  has  commanded  and  has  not  commanded, — and  there- 
fore competent  to  decide  what  we  are  to  believe  and  what  we 
are  not  to  believe,  and  what  we  are  to  do  and  what  we  are  not 
to  do.  But  this  is  to  assume  the  whole  for  private  judgment, 
and  therefore  to  assume  its  unrestricted  right.  We,  may,  then, 
assume,  in  the  second  place,  that  Protestantism  not  only  lays 
down  the  principle  of  the  right  of  all  men  to  private  judgment, 
but  the  right  of  all  men  to  the  univei-sal  or  unrestricted  right  of 
private  judgment. 

But  private  judginent  itself  is  not,  strictly  speaking,  ultimate, 
and  therefore,  though  it  be  the  principle  of  Protestantism,  is  not 
its  ultimate  principle.  The  ultimate  principle  of  Protestantism 
lies  a  little  ferther  back.  Rights  are  never  in  themselves  ulti- 
mate, but  must  always,  to  be  rights,  rest  on  some  foundation  or 
authority.  The  right  of  private  judgment  necessarily  implies 
some  principle  on  which  it  is  founded.  Every  judgment  is  by 
some  standard  or  measure ;  for  when  we  judge  it  is  always  fty 
something,  and  this,  whatever  it  is,  is  the  principle,  law,  rule, 
criterion,  standard,  or  measure  of  the  judgment.  In  every  act 
of  private  judgment  this  standard  or  measure  is  the  individual 
judging.     The  individual  judges  by  himself,  and  to  judge  by 


IN    TRAxVSCENDENTALISM.  225 

one's  self  is  precisely  what  is  meant  by  private  judgment.  In  it 
the  individual  is  both  measurer  and  measure, — in  a  word,  his 
own  yard-stick  of  truth  and  goodness.  But  rights,  to  be  rights, 
must  not  only  be  founded  on  some  principle,  but  on  a  true  prin- 
ciple ;  for  to  say  they,  are  founded  on  a*false  principle  is  only  say- 
ing in  other  words,  that  they  have  no  foundation  at  all.  The  right 
of  all  men  to  unrestricted  private  judgment,  then,  necessarily 
implies  that  each  and  every  man  is  in  himself  the  exact  measure 
of  truth  and  goodness.  In  laying  down  the  principle  of  private 
judgment  as  the  principle  of  its  dissent  from  the  Catholic  Church, 
Protestantism,  then,  necessarily  lays  down  the  principle,  that 
each  and  every  man  is  in  himself  the  exact  measure  of  truth 
and  goodness, — the  very  fundamental  proposition  of  Transcen- 
dentalism. The  identity  in  principle  is,  then,  perfect ;  and  no 
Protestant,  as  we  began  by  saying,  can  refuse  to  accept  Trans- 
cendentalism, with  all  its  legitimate  consequences,  without  con- 
demning himself  and  his  whole  party 

This  conclusion  is  undeniable,  for  the  acutest  dialectician  will 
find  no  break  or  flaw  in  the  chain  of  reasoning  by  which  it  is 
obtained.  We,  then,  may  assume  this  very  important  position, 
that  Transcendentalism  is  the  strict  logical  termination  of  Prot- 
estantism ;  and  if  some  Protestants,  as  is  the  case,  refuse  to  ad- 
mit it,  it  is  at  the  expense  of  their  dialectics ;  because  they  can- 
not, or  dare  not,  say.  Two  and  two  make  four,  but  judge  it  more 
prudent  to  say,  Two  and  two  make  five,  or  to  compromise  the 
matter  and  say,  Two  and  two  make  ihree.  There  are  few  things 
which  are  more  disgusting  than  the  cowardice  which  shrinks 
from  avowing  the  legitimate  consequences  of  one's  own  princi- 
ples. The  sin  of  inconsequence  is,  as  the  celebrated  Dr.  Evar- 
iste  de  Gypendole  justly  remarks,  a  mortal  sin, — at  least,  in  the 
eyes  of  humanity ;  for  it  is  high  treason  against  the  rational  na- 
ture itself;  and  he  who  dehberately  commits  it  voluntarily  ab- 
dicates reason,  and  takes  his  place  among  ir.ferior  and  irrational 
natures.  If  your  principles  are  sound,  you  cannot  push  them 
to  a  dangerous  extreme  ;  and  if  they  will  not  bear  pushing  to 


226  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

their  extreme  consequences,  you  should  know  that  they  are  un- 
sound, and  not  fit  to  be  entertained ;  for  it  is  always  lawful  to 
conclude  the  unsoundness  of  the  principle  from  the  unsoundness 
of  the  consequences. 

Taking  this  view  of  the  case,  we  confess  the  Transcendentalists 
a])pear  to  us  the  more  respectable,  and  indeed  the  only  respecta- 
ble because  the  only  consistent,  class  of  Protestants.  Consistent 
as  Protestants,  we  mean,  not  as  men ;  for  Transcendentalism  is 
the  ne  plus  ultra  of  inconsistency  and  absurdity ;  but  as  Prot- 
estants they  are  consistent  in  so  for  as  they  carry  out  with  an 
iron  logic  the  Protestant  principle  to  its  legitimate  results;  and 
in  doing  this,  in  the  providence  of  God,  they  are  rendering  no 
mea!i  service  to  the  cause  of  truth.  Tliey  are  a  living  and  prac- 
tical reductio  ad  absurdum  of  Protestantism.  They  strip  it  of 
its  disguises,  expose  it  in  its  nakedness,  and  subserve  the  cause 
of  truth  as  the  drunken  Helotae  subserved  the  cause  of  temper- 
ance in  the  Spartan  youth  by  exposing  to  them  the  disgusting 
effects  of  drunkenness. 

It  is  of  great  practical  importance  that  Protestantism  should 
be  exhibited  by  its  followers  in  its  true  light  as  it  really  is  in  it- 
self. Thus  far  Protestants  have  owned  their  success  and  influ- 
<?nGe,  in  the  main,  to  the  fact,  that  the  mass  of  them  have  never 
oeen  and  comprehended  Protestantism  in  its  simple,  unadulter- 
ated elements.  It  has  always  been  presented  to  them  in  a  livery 
stolen  from  Catholicity.  The  great  mass  of  the  Protestant  peo- 
ple, seeing  it  only  in  this  livery,  have  supposed  that  it  apper- 
tained to  the  household  of  foith,  and  that  they  had  in  it  all  that  is 
essential  to  the  Christian  religion.  Unable  to  penetrate  its  dis- 
guises, unable  to  distinguish  between  what  was  genuinely  Prot- 
estant and  what  was  surreptitiously  taken  from  the  Church,  they 
could  not  understand  the  force  or  truth  of  the  Catholic  accusa- 
tions against  them.  It  seemed  to  them  utterly  false  to  say  that 
they  had  no  faith,  no  church,  no  relig-ion,  and  that  their  Prot- 
estantism necessarily  involved  the  denial  of  the  whole  scheme  of 
revealed  religion,  and  left  them  in  reality  nothing  but  mere 
Naturalism.     Had  they  not  something  they  called  a  church  ? 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM.  227 

Haa  they  not  places  of  worship  modelled  after  Christian  tem- 
ples ?     Had  they  not  the  Holy  Scriptures,  pastors  and  teachers, 
hymns,  prayers, — all  the  exterior  forms  of  worship  ?     Did  they 
not  profess  to  believe  in  God,  the  Holy  Trinity,  the  Incarnation, 
the  Atonement,  the  necessity  of  Grace,  the  endless  punishment 
of  the  wicked,  and  the  eternal  beatitude  of  the  just, — all  that 
even  Catholic  doctors  have  ever  taught  that  it  is  necessary  ex 
necessitate  medii  ad  salutem  to  be  explicitly  believed?     Did 
they  not  try  to  lead  holy  and  devout  lives,  spend  much  time  in 
prayer  and  praise,  seek  earnestly  to  know  and  do  the  will  of 
God,  and  actually,  in  many  instances,  attain  to  a  moral  elevation 
which  would  more  than  compare  favorably  with  that  of  many 
Catholics  ?     How  say,  then,  that  we  have  no  religion,  that  our 
principles  are  at  war  with  Christianity,  and  lead  necessarily  to 
the  destruction  of  all  foith,  of  all  Christian  morality  ?     Have  we 
not  in  our  Protestantism,  as  we  hold  it,  a  li\ing  lie  to  your  un- 
just charge,  your  foul  aspersion?     It  must  be  confessed,  that 
appearances  to  the  Protestant,  were  much  against  the  Catholic, 
and  it  required  considerable  insight  and  firmness  of  logic  tc 
establish  the  charges  which  the  Cathohc,  from  the  principles  of 
an  infallible  faith,  was  fully  warranted  in  preferring.     But  time 
and  events  have  now  made  clear  and  certain  to  all  who  can  see 
and  reason,  what  then  seemed  so  doubtful,  not  to  say,  so  un- 
founded.    In  Transcendentalism,  which  is  both  the  logical  and 
historical  development  of  Protestantism,  it  may  now  be  seen 
that  the  Protestant,  not  the  Catholic,  was  deceived;  that  not 
the  Catholic  was  unjust  in  his  charges,  but  the  Protestant  was 
carried  away  by  his  delusions.     This  is  an  immense  gain,  and 
by  showing  this,  by  stripping  Protestantism  of  its  disguises,  by 
compelling  it  to  abandon  what  it  had  attempted  to  retain  of 
Catholicity,  and  to  restrict  it  to  its  own  principles,  Trancenden- 
talism  is  subserving  in  no  ordinary  degree  the  cause  of  religion 
and  morality.     Three  hundred  years  of  controversy  have  result- 
ed in  simpHfying  the  question,  and  in  making  up  the  true  and 
proper  issue.      If  the  true  and  proper  issue  could  have  been 
made  in  the  beginning,  Protestantism  would  have  died  in  its 


228  PROTESTANTISM   ENDS 

birth.  The  mass  of  those  who  have  followed  the  Protestant 
standard  have  done  so  because  they  supposed  they  had  in  the 
Holy  Scriptures  a  divine  authority  for  their  behef.  Here  was 
their  mother  delusion.  Catholics  have  really  in  the  Holy  Scrip- 
tures a  divine  authority,  because  they  receive  them  on  the  propo- 
sition of  the  Church  expressly  commissioned  by  Almighty  God 
to  propose  the  truth  revealed ;  but  Protestants,  as  we  have  seen, 
since  they  take  the  Holy  Scriptures  only  on  the  authority  of  pri- 
vate reason,  have  in  them  only  the  authority  of  private  reason, — • 
a  merely  human  authority.  It  is  now  seen  and  understood  that 
the  Scriptures,  if  taken  on  human  authority,  have  only  a  human 
authority ;  and  therefore,  as  Catholics  always  alleged,  Protest- 
ants, "with  all  their  pretensions,  have  only  a  human  authority  for 
the  dogmas  they  profess  to  derive  from  them,  and  therefore  are 
not,  and  never  have  been,  able  to  make  that  act  of  divine  faith 
without  which,  if  they  have  come  to  years  of  discretion,  they 
possess  no  Christian  virtue,  and  do  nothing  meritorious  for 
eternal  life.  If  Christianity  be  a  supernatural  hfe,  the  life  which 
begins  in  supernatural  faith  and  contemplates  a  supernatural 
destiny,  it  is  now  clear  that  Protestants  cannot  and  never  could 
claim  to  be  truly  within  the  pale  of  the  Christian  family,  but  do 
reject  and  always  have  virtually  rejected  the  Christian  religion 
itself 

This  being  so,  it  becomes  necessary  now  either  to  deny  the 
supernatural  character  of  the  Christian  life,  and  therefore  the 
necessity  of  divine  or  supernatural  faith,  or  to  give  up  Protest- 
antism as  having  no  claim  to  be  called  Christian.  This  is  be- 
coming a  general  conviction  among  Protestants  themselves,  and 
therefore  the  tendency  to  reject  Christianity,  as  a  supernatural 
religion,  is  manifesting  itself  all  over  the  Protestant  world.  Even 
Bishop  Butler,  the  great  Anglican  light  of  the  last  century,  de- 
clares the  Gospel  to  be  only  "  a  republication  of  the  law  of 
nature ; "  and  we  have  rarely  met  with  a  Protestant,  whatever 
might  be  his  unintelligible  jargon  about  the  New  Birth,  that 
did  not  hold,  substantially,  that  the  Christian  life  is  merely  the 
continuation   and  development  of  our   natural    life.     The   old 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM.  229 

modes  of  speech,  adopted  when  Christianity  was  held  to  be  a 
supernatural  religion,  are,  we  admit,  in  some  instances,  retained 
and  insisted  upon ;  but  they  have  lost  their  former  significance. 
Supernatural  is  defined  to  be  super  sensuous,  as  if  spiritual  ex- 
istences could  not  be  natural  as  well  as  material  existences.     It 
is  thus  Coleridge  defines  supernatural ;  it  is  thus,  also,  the  Su- 
pernaturaUsts  of  Germany,  of  the  school  of  Schleiermacher  and 
De  Wette,  understand  it,  while  the  Rationalists  deny  it  in  name 
as  well  as  in  reality.     In  no  higher  sense  do  we  find  the  word 
recognized   by   the    mass   of    Swiss  and    French    Protestants. 
"  What  did  Almighty  God  make  us  for  ? "  said  we,  the  other 
day,  to  a  worthy  Protestant  preacher,  not  without  note  in  this 
community  and  the  councils  of  his  country.     "  To  develope  and 
perfect  our  spiritual  natures,"  was  the  ready  reply  ;  that  is,  to 
finish  the  work  which  Almighty  God  began,  but  left  incomplete  ; 
and  this  is  the  reply  which,  in  substance,  is  almost  universally 
given  by  those  Protestants  who  plume  themselves  on  having 
pure  and  ennobhng  spiritual  views  of  religion.     Thus  it  is,  men 
everywhere  lose  sight  of  their  supernatural  destiny,  and  then 
deny  the  necessity  of  a  supernatural  life,  and  then  the  necessity 
of  grace.     Thus,  in  substance,  if  not  in  name,  they  reject  the 
doctrines  of  the  Trinity,  the  Incarnation,  the  Miraculous  Con- 
ception and  Birth  of  our  Saviour,  Original  Sin,  the  Atonement, 
Remission  of  Sins,  the  Plenary  Inspiration  of  the  Scriptures, 
and,  finally,  all  that  is  incompatible  with  the  principle  of  man's 
sufficiency  for  himself,  as  so  many  reminiscences  of  Popery,  or 
traditions  of  the  Dark  Ages,  and  as  interposing  between  the 
human  soul  and  its  Creator,   and  hindering  its  freedom  ant. 
growth.     It  is  idle  to  deny,  that  all  over  the  Protestant  world 
the  tendency  to  this  result  is  strong  and  irresistible,  and  that  i 
is  already  reached  by  the  more  thinking  and  enlightened  por- 
tion of  Protestants.     The  true  and  proper  issue,  then,  cannot  be 
really  any  longer  evaded.     Protestants  must  meet  the  simple 
questions  of  Naturalism  or  Supernaturalism,  of  Transcendentalism 
or  Catholicity,  of  man  or  God. 

No  doubt,  a  certain  class  of  Protestant  doctors  do,  and  will, 


230  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

for  some  little  time  to  come,  struggle  to  stave  off  this  issue,  but 
in  vain.    Matters  have  proceeded  too  far.    It  is  too  late.    1'he  in- 
ternal developments  of  Protestantism  are  too  far  completed,  the 
spirit  at  work  in  the  Protestant  ranks  is  too  powerful,  to  prevent 
the  direct  issue  from  being  made.     Transcendentalism,  under 
one  form  or  another,  has  struck  its  roots  so  deep,  has  spread  out 
its  branches  so  far,  and  finds  so  rich  a  soil,  that  it  must  ere  long 
cause  all  the  other  forms  of  Protestantism,  as  the  underbrush  in 
a  thick  forest,  to  die  out  and  disappear.     The  spirit  of  inquiry 
which  Protestantism  boasts  of  having  quickened,  the  disposition 
to  bring  every  question,  the  most  intricate  and  the  most  sacred, 
to  the  test  of  private  judgment,  which  she  fosters,  and  which  it 
would  be  suicidal  in  her  to  discountenance,  will  compel  these 
doctors  themselves  either  to  give  up  their  vocations,  or  to  fall 
into  the  current  and  suffer  themselves  to  be  borne  on  to  its  term- 
ination.    Resistance  is  madness.     The  movement  party  advances 
with  a  steady  step,  and  will  drive  all  before  it.     "Whatever  Evan- 
gelical doctor  throws  himself  in  its  path  to  stay  its  onward  march 
is  a  dead  man  and  ground  to  powder.     There  is  no  alternative ; 
you  must  follow  Schlegel,   Hurter,  Newman,   Faber,  back  into 
the  bosom  of  Catholic  unity,  or  go  on  with  Emerson,  Parker, 
and  Carlyle.     Not  to-day  only  have  we  seen  this.     Think  you 
that  we,  who,  according  to  your  own  story,  have  tried  every  form 
of  Protestantism,  and  disputed  every  inch  of  Protestant  ground, 
would  ever  have  left  the  ranks  of  Protestantism  in  which  we 
were  born,  and  under  whose  banner  we  had  fought  so  long  and 
suffered  so  much,  if  there  had  been  any  other  alternative  for  us  ? 
The  "  No  Popery  "  cry  which  our  Evangelicals  are  raising, 
and  which  rings  in  our  ears  from  every  quarter,  does  not  in  the 
least  discompose  us.     In  this  very  cry  we  hear  an  additional 
proof  of  what  we  are  maintaining.     We  understand  the  full  sig- 
nificance of  this  cry.     The  Protestant  masses  are  escaping  from 
their  leaders.     The  sectarian  ministers,  especially  of  the  species 
Evangelical^  are  losing  their  hold  on  their  flocks,  and  finding 
that  their  old  petrified  forms,  retained  from  Luther,  or  Calvin, 
or  Knox,  will  no  longer  satisfy  them, — have  no  longer  vitality 


IN    TRANSCENDENTALISM.  231 

for  tliem.  Their  craft  is  in  clanger ;  their  power  and  influence 
are  departing,  and  Ichahod  is  beginning  to  be  written  on  their 
foreheads.  They  see  the  handwriting  on  the  wall,  and  feel  that 
something  must  be  done  to  avert  the  terrible  doom  that  awaits 
them.  Fearfulness  and  trerabhng  seize  them,  and,  like  the 
drowning  man,  they  catch  at  the  fii*st  straw,  and  hope,  and  yet 
with  the  mere  hope  of  despair,  that  it  will  prove  a  plank  of 
safety.  They  have  no  resource  in  their  old,  dried-up,  dead  forms. 
They  must  look  abroad,  call  in  some  extrinsic  aid,  and,  by  means 
of  some  foreign  power,  delay  the  execution  of  the  judgment  they 
feel  in  their  hearts  has  already  been  pronounced  against  them. 
They  must  get  up  some  excitement  which  will  captivate  the 
people  and  blind  their  reason.  No  excitement  seems  to  them 
more  likely  to  answer  their  purpose  than  a  "  No  Popery  "  ex- 
citement, which  they  fancy  will  find  a  firm  support  in  the  hered- 
itary passions  and  prejudices  of  their  flocks.  Here  is  the  sig- 
nificance of  this  "  No  Popery"  excitement. 

But  this  excitement  will  prove  suicidal.  Times  have  changed, 
and  matters  do  not  stand  as  they  did  in  the  days  of  Luther,  and 
Zwingle,  and  Henry,  and  Calvin,  and  Knox.  The  temper  of 
men's  minds  is  different,  and  there  is  a  new  order  of  questions 
up  for  solution.  The  old  watchwords  no  longer  answer  the  pur- 
pose. What  avails  it  to  prove  the  Pope  to  be  Antichrist,  to 
populations  that  do  not  even  beheve  in  Christ  ?  What  avails  it 
to  thunder  at  Catholicity  with  texts  which  are  no  longer  believed 
to  have  a  divine  authority  ?  Protestantism  must  now  fall  back 
on  her  own  principles,  and  fight  her  battles  with  her  own  weap- 
ons. She  must  throw  out  her  ow^n  banner  to  the  breeze,  and 
call  upon  men  to  gather  and  arm  and  fight  for  progress,  for 
liberty,  for  the  unrestricted  right  of  private  judgment,  or  she  will 
not  rally  a  corporal's  guard  against  Catholity.  But  the  moment 
she  does  this,  she  is,  as  the  French  say,  enfoncee ;  for  she  has 
subsisted  and  can  subsist  only  by  professing  one  thing  and  doing 
another.  Let  our  Evangelical  doctors,  in  their  madness,  rally, 
in  the  name  of  progress,  of  liberty,  of  private  judgment,  an 
army  to  put  down  the  Pope,  and  the  matter  will  not  end  there. 


232  PROTESTANTISM    ENDS 

Their  forces,  furnished  with  arms  against  Catholicity,  will  turn 
upon  themselves,  and  in  a  hoarse  voice,  and  if  need  be,  from 
brazen  throats  and  tongues  of  flame,  exclaim,  "  No  more  sham^ 
gentlemen.  We  go  for  principle.  We  do  not  unpope  the  Pope 
to  find  a  new  pope  in  each  petty  presbyter,  and  a  spy  and  in- 
former in  each  brother  or  sister  communicant.  You  are  noth- 
ing to  lis.  Freedom,  gentlemen;  doff  your  gowns,  abrogate 
all  your  creeds  and  confessions,  break  up  all  your  religious  or- 
ganizations, abolish  all  forms  of  worship  except  such  as  each 
individual  may  choose  and  exercise  for  himself,  and  acknowledge 
in  fact,  as  well  as  in  name,  that  every  man  is  free  to  worship  one 
God  or  twenty  Gods,  or  no  God  at  all,  as  seems  to  him  good, 
unlicensed,  unquestioned,  or  take  the  consequences.  We  will 
no  more  submit  to  your  authority  than  you  will  to  that  of  the 
Pope." 

This  is  the  tone  and  these  the  terms  in  which  these  "No 
Popery"  doctors  will  find,  one  of  these  days,  their  flocks  address- 
ing them ;  for  we  have  only  given  words  to  what  they  know  as 
well  as  we  is  the  predominant  feeling  of  the  great  majority  of  the 
Protestant  people.  The  very  means,  in  the  present  temper  of 
the  Protestant  public,  they  must  use  to  insure  their  success,  can- 
not foil  to  prove  their  ruin.  They  will  only  hasten  the  issue 
they  would  evade.  Deprived,  as  they  now  are,  for  the  most 
part,  of  all  direct  aid  from  the  civil  power,  the  force  of  things  is 
against  them,  and  it  matters  little  whether  they  attempt  to 
move  or  sit  still.  They  were  mad  enough  in  the  beginning  to 
take  their  stand  on  a  movable  foundation,  and  they  must  move 
on  with  it,  or  be  left  to  balance  themselves  in  vacuity ;  and  if 
they  do  move  on  with  it,  they  will  simply  arrive — nowhither. 
They  are  doomed,  and  they  cannot  escape.  Hence  it  is  all  their 
motions  afiect  us  only  as  the  writhings  and  death-throes  of  the 
serpent  whose  head  is  crushed. 

Regarding  it  of  the  greatest  importance  that  the  whole  matter 
should  be  brought  to  its  true  and  proper  issue,  and  believing 
firmly,  that  when  the  real  alternatives  are  distinctly  apprehended 
and  admitted,  that  many  Protestants  will  choose  "  the  better 


IN   TRANSCENDENTALISM.  233 

part,"  we  are  not  displeased  to  witness  tlie  very  decided  tend- 
ency to  Transcendentalism  now  manifesting  itself  throughout 
the  Protestant  world.     It  is  a  proof  to  us  that  the  internal  de- 
velopments  of  Protestantism   are   not  only  bringing  it  to  its 
strictly  logical  termination,  but,  what  is  more  important  still,  to 
the  term  of  its  existence.     The  nations  which  became  Protest- 
ant rebelled  against  the  God  of  their  fathers,  the  God  who  had 
brought  them  up  out  of  the  bondage  of  ignorance,  barbarism, 
idolatry,  and  superstition,  and  said  they  would  not  have  him  to 
reign  over  them,  but  they  would  lienceforth  be  their  own  mas- 
ters, and  rule  themselves.     He,  for  wise  and  merciful   but  in- 
scrutable purposes,  gave  them  up  to  then*  reprobate  sense,  left 
them  to  themselves,  to  follow  their  own  wills,  till  hitler  experi- 
ence should  teach  them  their  wickedness,  their  impiety,  their 
folly  and  madness,  and  bring  them  in  shame  and  confusion  to 
pray,  "  O  Lord,  in  thy  wrath  remember  mercy ;  save  us  from 
ourselves,  or  we  perish  !"     To  this  desirable  result  it  was  not  to 
be  expected  they  would  come  till  Protestantism  had  run  its 
natural  course,  and  reached  its  legitimate  termination.     They 
would  not  abandon  it  till  they  had  exhausted  all  its  possibilities, 
and  till  it  could  no  longer  present  a  new  face  to  charm  or  de- 
lude them.     In  this  Transcendental  tendency,  we  see  the  evi- 
dence that  it  has  run  or  very  nearly  run  its  natural  course,  and 
in  Transcendentalism  reaches  its  termination,  exhausts  itself,  and 
can  go  no  farther ;  for  there  is  no  farther.     Beyond  Transcend- 
entalism, in  the  same  direction,  there  is  no  place.     Transcend- 
entalism is  the  last  stage  this  side  of  nowhere;  and  when 
reached,  we  must  hold  up,  or  fly  off  into  boundless  vacuity.     In 
its  prevalence,  then,  we  may  trust  we  see  the  signs  of  a  change 
near  at  hand ;  and  any  change  must  certainly  be  in  a  better 
direction. 


234  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

PROTESTANTISM  IN  A  NUTSHELL  * 

OCTOBER,    1849. 

We  liave  seen  few  works  written  with  a  more  just  apprecia- 
tion of  our  age  tlian  the  one  before  us,  or  so  well  adapted  to  the 
present  state  of  the  controversy  whicli  we  are  always  obliged  to 
carry  on  with  the  enemies  of  the  Church.  Its  author  under- 
stands well  the  essential  nature  of  Protestantism,  and  clearly 
and  distinctly  points  out  the  proper  method  of  meeting  it  under 
the  various  forms  it  at  present  assumes,  and  of  imposing  silence 
on  its  arrogant  and  noisy  pretentions.  He  does  not  confine 
himself  to  the  field  of  theological  controversy,  properly  so  called, 
but  he  meets  Protestants  on  their  own  chosen  ground,  on  the 
broad  field  of  European  civilization,  and  shows  them  that,  under 
the  point  of  view  of  civilization,  of  liberty,  order,  and  social 
well-being.  Protestantism  has  been  a  total  failure,  and  that,  even 
in  reference  to  this  world,  Cathohcity  has  found  itself  as  superior 
to  it  as  it  claims  to  be  in  regard  to  the  world  to  come.  He 
does  not  merely  vindicate  Catholicity,  in  relation  to  civilization, 
fioni  the  charges  preferred  against  it  by  the  modern  advocates 
of  liberalism  and  Progressism,  but  by  a  calm  appeal  to  history 
and  philosophy,  he  shows  that  the  opposing  system  has  inter- 
ru])ted  the  work  of  civilization  which  the  Church  was  prosecut- 
ing with  vigor  and  success,  and  has  operated  solely  in  the  inter- 
est of  barbarism.  In  doing  this,  he  has  done  a  real  service  to 
the  cause  of  truth,  and  we  learn  with  pleasure  that  one  of  our 
friends  in  England  has  translated  his  work,  originally  written 
Spanish,  and  rendered  it  accessible  to  the  great  body  of  English 
and  American  readers. 

Such  a  work  as  this  was  much  needed  in  our  language.  We 
have,  indeed,  many  able  controversial  works, — works  admirable 

*  Le  Protestantisme  compare  au  Catholicisme  dans  ses  Rapports  avec 
la  Civilisation  Evu'opeenne.  Par  M.  l'Abbe  Jacques  Balmes.  Paris : 
Debr^court.     1842-44.     3  tomes      8vo. 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  235 

for  the  learning,  ability,  and  skill  of  their  authors  ;  but  we 
have  comparatively  few  which  are  adapted  to  the  present  state 
of  the  controversy  with  Protestants.  The  greater  part  of  those 
accessible  to  the  mere  English  reader  are  well  adapted  only  to 
the  few  individuals  whose  hearts  the  grace  of  God  has  ah-eady 
touched,  and  whose  faces  are  already  set  towards  the  Church. 
Truth  is  one  and  invariable,  but  error  is  variable  and  manifold. 
It  is  always  the  same  truth  that  we  must  oppose  to  error,  but  it 
is  seldom  the  same  error  for  two  successive  moments  to  which 
we  must  oppose  it.  AVe  must  shoot  error,  as  well  as  folly,  "  as 
it  flies."  and  we  must  be  able  to  shoot  it  under  ever-varying  and 
varied  disguises.  The  works  we  have,  excellent  as  they  are  in 
their  way,  and  admirably  fitted  to  guard  the  faithful  against 
many  of  the  devices  of  the  enemy  to  detach  them  from  the 
Church,  and  to  aid  and  instruct  persons  in  heretical  communions 
who  are  virtually  prepared  to  return  to  the  Church,  do  not  hit 
the  reigning  form  of  Protestantism  ;  they  do  not  reach  the  seat 
of  the  disease,  and  are  apparently  written  on  the  supposition  of 
soundness,  where  there  is,  in  fact,  only  rottenness.  The  princi- 
ples tbey  assume  as  the  basis  of  their  refutation  of  Protestantism, 
though  nominally  professed  or  conceded  by  the  majority  of  Pro- 
testants, are  not  held  with  sufficient  firmness  to  be  used  as  the 
foundation  of  an  argument  that  is  to  have  any  practical  efficacy 
in  their  conversion.  They  all  appear  to  assume  that  Protestants 
as  a  body  really  mean  to  be  Christians,  and  err  only  in  regard  to 
some  of  the  dogmas  of  Christianity  and  the  method  of  deter- 
mining the  faith  ;  that  Protestantism  is  a  specific  heresy,  a  dis- 
tinct and  positive  form  of  error,  like  Arianism  or  Pelagianism; 
and  that  its  adherents  would  regard  themselves  as  bound  to  re- 
ject it,  if  proved  to  be  repugnant  to  Christianity,  or  contrary  to 
the  Holy  Scriptures.  This  is  a  natural  and  a  charitable  suppo- 
sition ;  but  we  are  sorry  to  say,  that,  if  it  was  ever  warrantable, 
it  is  not  by  any  means  warrantable  in  our  times,  except  as  to 
the  small  number  of  individuals  in  the  several  sects  who  are 
mere  exceptions  to  the  rule.  Protestantism  is  no  specific  heresy, 
is  no  distinct  or  positive  form  of  error,  but  error  in  general,  in- 


236  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

difterent  to  forms,  and  receptible  of  any  form  or  of  all  forms,  as 
suits  the  convenience  or  the  exigency  of  its  friends.  It  is  a  ver- 
itable Proteus,  and  takes  any  and  every  shape  judged  to  be 
proper  to  deceive  the  eyes  or  to  elude  the  blows  of  the  cham- 
pions of  truth.  It  is  Lutheran,  Calvinistic,  Arminian,  Unitarian, 
Pantheistic,  Atheistic,  Pyrrhonistic,  each  by  turns  or  all  at  once, 
as  is  necessary  to  its  purpose.  The  Protestant  as  such  has,  in 
the  ordinary  sense,  no  principles  to  maintain,  no  character  to  sup- 
port, no  consistency  to  preserve ;  and  we  are  aware  of  no  au- 
thority, no  law,  no  iLsage,  by  which  he  will  consent  to  be  bound. 
Convict  him  from  tradition,  and  he  appeals  to  the  Bible ;  convict 
him  from  the  Bible,  and  he  appeals  to  reason ;  convict  him  from 
reason,  and  he  appeals  to  private  sentiment ;  convict  him  from 
private  sentiment,  and  he  appeals  to  skepticism,  or  flies  back  to 
reason,  to  Scripture,  or  tradition,  and  alternately  from  one  to  the 
other, — never  scrupling  to  affirm,  one  moment,  what  he  denied 
the  moment  before,  nor  blushing  to  be  found  maintaining,  that, 
of  contradictories,  both  may  be  true.  He  is  indifferent  as  to 
what  he  asserts  or  denies,  if  able  for  the  moment  to  obtain  an 
apparent  covert  from  his  pursuers. 

Protestants  do  not  study  for  the  ti'uth,  and  are  never  to  be 
presumed  willing  to  accept  it,  unless  it  chances  to  be  where  and 
what  they  wish  it.  They  occasionally  read  our  books  and  listen 
to  our  arguments,  but  rarely  to  ascertain  our  doctrines,  or  to 
learn  what  we  are  able  to  say  against  them  or  for  ourselves.  The 
thought,  that  we  may  possibly  be  right,  seldom  occurs  to  them  ; 
and  when  it  does,  it  is  instantly  suppressed  as  an  evil  thought, 
as  a  temptation  from  the  Devil.  They  take  it  for  granted,  that, 
ao-ainst  us,  they  are  right,  and  cannot  be  wrong.  This  is  with 
them  a  "  fixed  fact, "  admitting  no  question.  They  condescend 
to  consult  our  writings,  or  to  listen  to  our  arguments,  only  to 
ascertain  what  doctrines  they  can  profess,  or  what  modifications 
they  can  introduce  into  those  which  they  have  professed,  that  will 
best  enable  them  to  elude  our  attacks,  or  give  them  the  appear- 
ance of  escaping  conviction  by  the  authorities  from  ti-adition. 
Scripture,  reason,  and  sentiment  which  we  an-ay  against  them. 


PROTESTANTISM    I.V    A    NUTSHELL.  237 

Candor  or  ingenuousness  towards  themselves  even  is  a  thing 
wholly  foreign  to  their  Protestant  nature,  and  they  are  instinct- 
ively and  habitually  cavillers  and  sophisticators.  They  disdain 
to  argue  a  question  on  its  merits,  and  always,  if  they  argue  at 
all,  argue  it  on  some  unimportant  collateral.  They  never  recog- 
nize— unless  it  is  for  their  interest  to  do  so — any  distinction  be- 
tween a  transeat  and  a  concedo,  and  rarely  fail  to  insist  that  the 
concession  of  an  irrelevant  point  is  a  concession  of  the  main 
issue.  They  have  no  sense  of  responsibleness,  no  loyalty  to 
truth,  no  mental  chastity,  no  intellectual  sincerity.  What  is 
for  them  is  authority  which  no  body  must  question;  what  is 
against  them  is  no  authority  at  all.  Their  own  word  if  not  in 
their  favor,  they  refuse  to  accept ;  and  the  authority  to  which 
they  professedly  appeal  they  repudiate  the  moment  it  is  seen  not 
to  sustain  them.  To  reason  with  them  as  if  they  would  stand 
by  their  own  professions,  or  could  or  w^ould  acknowledge  any 
authority  but  their  own  ever- varying  opinions,  is  entirely  to  mis- 
take them,  and  to  betray  our  own  simplicity. 

Undoubtedly,  many  of  our  friends,  who  have  not,  like  our- 
selves, been  brought  up  Protestants,  and  have  not  to  blush  at  the 
knowledge  their  Protestant  experience  has  given  them,  may  feel 
that  in  this  judgment  we  are  rash  and  uncharitable.  Would 
that  we  were  so.  We  take  no  pleasure  in  thinking  ill  of  any 
portion  of  our  fellow-men,  and  would  always  rather  find  our- 
selves wrong  in  our  unfavorable  judgments  of  them  than  right. 
But  in  this  matter  the  evidence  is  too  clear  and  conclusive  to 
allow  us  even  to  hope  that  we  are  wrong.  There  is  not  a  single 
Protestant  doctrine  opposed  to  Catholicity  that  even  Protestants 
themselves  have  not  over  and  over  again  completely  refuted; 
there  is  not  a  single  charge  brought  by  Protestants  against  th«' 
Chui'ch  that  some  of  them,  as  well  as  we,  have  not  fully  exploded  ; 
and  no  more  conclusive  vindication  of  the  claims  of  Catholicity 
can  be  desired  than  may  be — nay,  than  in  fact  has  been — collect- 
ed from  distinguished  Protestant  writers  themselves.  This  is  a 
fact  which  no  Protestant,  certainly  no  Catholic,  can  deny.  How 
happens  it,  then,  that  the  Protestant  world  still  subsists,  and 


238  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

that,  for  the  last  hundred  and  fifty  years,  we  have  made  compar- 
atively httle  progress  in  reo'aining  Protestants  to  the  Church? 

We  may,  it  is  true,  be  referred  to  the  obstinacy  in  error  char- 
acteristic of  all  heretics ;  but,  in  the  present  case, — unless  what 
is  meant  is  obstinacy  in  error  in  general,  and  not  in  error  in  par- 
ticular,— this  will  not  suffice  as  an  answer ;  because,  during  this 
period,  there  has  been  no  one  particular  form  of  error  to  which 
Protestants  have  uniformly  adhered.  No  class  of  Protestants 
adheres  to-day  to  the  opinions  it  originally  avowed.  In  this  res- 
pect, there  is  a  marked  difference  between  the  Protestant  sects  of 
modern  times  and  the  early  Oriental  sects.  The  Jacobite  holds 
to-day  the  same  specific  heresy  which  he  held  a  thousand  years 
ago ;  and  the  Nestorian  of  the  nineteenth  is  substantially  the 
Nestorian  of  the  fourth  century.  But  nothing  analogous  is  true 
of  any  of  the  modern  Protestant  sects.  Protestants  boast,  in- 
deed, their  glorious  Reformation,  but  they  no  longer  hold  the 
views  of  its  authors.  Luther,  were  he  to  ascend  to  the  scenes 
of  his  earthly  labors,  would  be  utterly  unable  to  recognize  his 
teachings  in  the  doctrines  of  the  modorn  Lutherans ;  the  Calvin- 
ist  remains  a  Calvinist  only  in  name ;  the  Baptist  disclaims  his 
Anabaptist  original ;  the  Unitarian  points  out  the  errors  he  de- 
tects in  his  Socinian  ancestors ;  and  the  Transcendentalist  looks 
down  with  pity  on  his  Unitarian  parents,  while  he  considers  it  a 
cruel  persecution  to  be  excluded  from  the  Unitarian  fomily.  No 
sect  retains,  unmodified,  unchanged,  the  precise  form  of  error 
with  which  it  set  out.  All  the  forms  Protestants  have  from  time 
to  time  assumed  have  been  developed,  modified,  altered,  almost 
Bs  soon  as  assumed, — always  as  internal  or  external  controversy 
made  it  necessary  or  expedient.  Here  is  a  fact  nobody  can  deny, 
nnd  it  proves  conclusively  that  the  Protestant  world  does  not 
subsist  solely  by  virtue  of  its  obstinate  attachment  to  the  views 
or  opinions  to  which  it  has  once  committed  itself,  or  in  conse- 
quence of  its  avei-sion  to  change  the  doctrines  it  has  once  pro- 
fessed. 

This  fact  proves  even  more  than  this.  Bossuet  very  justly 
concludes  from    the    variations  of  Protestantism    its    ohjertive 


PROTESTANTISM  rs  A  ynSHELL.  239 

felsity,  because  the  characteristic  of  truth  is  invariabihtj ;  but 
we  maj  go  ferther,  and  from  the  same  variatioiis  condode  the 
subjective  falsitj  of  Protestantism,  or  that  Protestants  have  no 
real  belief  in,  or  attachment  to,  the  particular  doctrines  they 
profess, — not  only  that  Protestants  profess  a  feke  doctrine,  but 
that  they  are  insecere,  and  destitute,  as  a  body,  of  real  honesty 
in  their  professions.  If  they  beheved  their  doctrines,  they  could 
never  tolerate  the  changes  they  undergo.  ^NTew  sects  might,  in- 
deed, arise  among  them,  but  no  sect  would  suffer  its  original  doc- 
trines to  be  in  the  least  altered  or  modiBed.  The  members  of 
every  sect,  if  they  believed  its  creed,  would,  so  long  as  they  ad- 
hered to  it,  be  struck  with  horror  at  the  bare  idea  of  altering  or 
modifring  it ;  for  it  would  seem  to  them  to  be  altering  or  modi- 
fying the  revealed  Word  of  God.  This  is  a  point  of  no  sHght 
importance  in  judging  the  Protestant  world,  and  seems  to  us  to 
deserve  more  attention  than  the  great  body  of  Catholics  even 
are  disposed  to  give  it.  These  variations  prove,  at  least,  that 
Protestantism  is  something  distinct  from  the  formal  teachings 
of  Protestants,  and  something  that  can  and  does  survive  them. 

That  we  are  neither  rash  nor  uncharitable  in  our  judgment 
of  Protestants,  severe  as  it  unquestionably  is,  may  be  collected 
from  facts  of  daily  occurrence.  The  great  body  of  Protestants, 
it  is  well  known,  labor  unceasingly  to  detach  Cathohcs  from  the 
Church,  and  to  this  end  use  all  the  means  the  age  and  countiy 
will  tolerate.  It  was  to  combine  their  forces  against  Catholicity, 
that  a  few  years  since,  under  the  pontificate  of  Gregory  XTL, 
the  Protestant  minl-ters  held  their  World's  Convention  in  Lon- 
don ;  that  they  formed  Protestant  alliances  in  England,  Ger- 
many. France,  Switzerland,  and  this  country,  devised  a  plan  in 
concert  with  the  Italian  refugees  in  these  several  countries  for 
effecting  a  civil  revolution  in  every  Catholic  state,  especially  in 
the  Papal  States,  and  called  upon  tlie  Protestant  people  every- 
where to  contribute  funds  for  carrying  it  out, — a  plan,  even  to 
minute  particulars,  which  the  well-known  ministers,  Bacon, 
Coxe,  Beecher,  Kirk,  and  others,  forewarned  us  of  in  a  meeting 
of  the  Protestant  Alliance  in  this  citv  ir  1845,  and  which  we 


240  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

have  seen  to  a  great  extent  realized  during  the  last  two  years, 
much  to  the  joy  of  thousands  of  nominal  Catholics,  who  little 
suspected  themselves  to  be  the  dupes  of  miserable  demagogues 
on  the  one  hand,  and  of  hypocritical  Protestant  ministers  on  the 
other.  But  while  Protestants,  in  season  and  out  of  season,  by 
means  fair  and  by  means  foul,  by  means  open  and  by  means 
secret  and  tortuous,  seek  to  detach  Catholics  from  the  Church, 
they  appear  quite  indifferent  as  to  which  of  the  thousand  and 
one  Protestant  formulas  they  are  led  to  embrace,  or  whether, 
indeed,  they  are  led  to  embrace  any  one  of  them.  Excepting, 
as  we  always  do,  here  and  there  an  individual,  they  are  satisfied 
with  the  simple  fact,  that  those  drawn  off  from  the  Church  are 
no  longer  Catholics.  Whatever  we  lose,  they  count  their  gain, 
and  although  they  are  well  aware  that  the  majority  of  those 
they  gain  from  us  turn  out  rank  apostates,  infidels,  and  blas- 
phemers, they  nevertheless  rejoice  over  them,  and  claim  them  as 
so  many  accessions  to  their  ranks.  If  Protestants  had  any  sin- 
cerity in  their  professions,  if  they  had  any  sense  of  religion,  how 
could  they  regard  themselves  as  triumphing  in  proportion  as 
they  succeed  in  detaching  miserable  wretches  from  us,  and  sink- 
ing them  in  religion  even  below  the  ancient  heathen, — especially 
since  none  of  them  dare  pretend  that  we  do  not  embrace  all  the 
essentials  of  the  Christian  religion,  or  that  salvation  is  not  attain- 
able in  our  Church  ?  They  profess  to  be  Christians,  but  they 
would  rather  make  us  infidels,  apostates,  atheists,  blasphemers, 
than  suffer  us  to  remain  Catholics.  What  more  conclusive  proof 
can  you  ask  of  their  insincerity, — of  the  fact  that  their  profes- 
sions afford  no  clew  to  the  real  state  of  their  minds,  and  ought 
to  count  for  nothing  ? 

Doubtless,  we  are  not  to  be  understood  to  imply  that  Prot- 
estants are  always  distinctly  conscious  of  their  own  want  of  strict 
honesty  and  sincerity.  No  man  knoweth  whether  he  deserveth 
love  or  hatred.  Knowledge  of  one's  self  is  hard  to  acquire; 
self  deception  is  one  of  the  easiest  things  in  the  world,  and  few 
there  are  who  are  certain  that  they  have  a  good  conscience,  or 
are  sure  of  the  motives  which  govern  them.     No  doubt,  Prot- 


FROTESTAKTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 


241 


estants  g  loss  over  their  conduct,  and  have  some  method  of  justi- 
fying it  in  their  own  eyes ;  no  doubt,  they  persuade  themselves 
that  they  arc  sincere, — at  least  as  sincere  as  they  can  afford  to 
be,  as  honest  in  their  belief  as  people  generally  are ;  but  they 
know  not  what  manner  of  spirit  they  are  of,  and  as  that  spirit 
is  inherently  a  lying  spirit,  as  Catholics  well  know,  it  must  needs 
lie  unto  themselves  as  well  as  unto  others.  Probably  every 
heresiarch  dupes  himself  before  he  dupes  others,  and  holds  the 
post  of  leader  only  because  a  greater  dupe  than  his  followers. 
That  kind  of  honesty  and  sincerity  compatible  with  a  false  spirit 
and  gross  delusion,  we  are  not  disposed  to  deny  to  Protestants ; 
bui  we  should  remember  that  no  really  sincere  and  truthful 
mind  ever  is  or  ever  can  be  deluded.  No  man  ever  is  or  ever 
was  strictly  honest  and  sincere  in  the  profession  of  a  false  doc- 
ti-iue, — for  no  false  doctrine  can  ever,  in  the  nature  of  things, 
be  so  evidenced  as  to  exclude  doubt ;  and  he  who  professes  to 
believe  what  he  doubts  professes  what  he  knows  he  does  not 
believe,  and  therefore  professes  what  he  knows  is  not  true.  A 
man  may  be  honestly  in  doubt  as  to  what  is  or  is  not  the  truth 
on  certain  points ;  but  no  man  can  honestly  profess  faith  in  a 
false  doctrine, — for  in  a  false  doctrine  no  man  can  have  faith. 

A  sort  of  honesty  and  sincerity  we  certainly  concede  to  the 
generahty  of  Protestants  ;  but  as  to  the  end  for  which  they  pro- 
fess their  doctrines,  rather  than  as  to  the  doctrines  themselves. 
The  principle  common  to  them,  and  the  only  one  we  can  always 
be  sure  they  will  practically  adhere  to,  is,  that  the  end  justifies 
the  means.  The  end  they  propose  is,  neither  to  save  their  souls 
nor  to  discover  and  obey  the  truth,  but  to  destroy  or  elude  Cath- 
olicity. The  spirit  which  possesses  them  maddens  them  against 
the  Church,  and  gives  them  an  inward  repugnance  to  everything 
not  opposed  to  her.  To  overthrow  her,  to  blot  out  her  exist- 
ence, or  to  prevent  her  from  crushing  them  with  the  weight  of 
her  truth,  is  to  them  a  praiseworthy  end,  at  least  a  gi-eat  and 
most  desirable  end;  directly  or  indirectly,  consciously  or  un- 
consciously, it  becomes  the  ruhng  passion — after  money -getting 
— of  their  lives, — a  passion  in  which  they  are  confirmed  and 

11 


242  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  ■* 

strengthened  by  all  the  blandishments  of  the  world,  and  all  the 
seductions  of  the  flesh.  Any  means  which  tend  to  gratify  this 
passion,  to  realize  this  end,  they  hold  to  be  lawful,  and  they  caD 
adopt  them,  however  base,  detestable,  or  shocking  in  themselves, 
with  a  quiet  conscience  and  admirable  self-complacency. 

That  the  ruling  motive  or  dominant  instinct  of  Protestants,  in 
their  character  of  Protestants,  is,  at  least  under  a  negative  point 
of  view  to  destroy  or  elude  Cathohcity,  is  evident  from  the  char- 
acter of  the  variations  which  their  Protestantism  has  undergone, 
and  is  daily  and  hourly  undergoing.  Examine  these  variations, 
and  you  will  find  that  they  each  and  all  tend  to  remove  Protest- 
antism farther  and  farther  from  the  Catholic  standard,  and  to 
shelter  it  from  the  blows  of  Catholic  assailants.  Each  successive 
reformer  eliminates  from  his  sect  some  Catholic  doctrine  which 
it  may  have  retained,  or  modifies  some  element  of  which  he  sees 
the  Catholic  controversialist  can  take  advantage.  The  tendency 
of  the  Protestant  world,  collectively  and  in  each  of  its  divisions 
and  subdivisions,  has  been  steadily  in  the  direction  from  the 
Chui'ch  against  which  it  protests,  and  the  progress  which  Prot- 
estants so  loudly  boast,  luis  consisted,  and  still  consists,  in  get- 
ting rid  of  what  they  originally  retained  in  common  with  Catho- 
lics. The  Protestant  vanguard,  which  announces  that  the  main 
body  is  at  hand,  has  advanced  very  far,  and  retains  less  of  Chris- 
tian principle  than  was  retained  by  the  old  heathen  world  in 
the  times  of  the  Aposths.  Take  your  fully  developed  Trans- 
ceiiilontalist,  the  last  word  of  Protestantism,  and  you  will  find 
him  divested  of  every  Catholic  principle,  and,  under  the  point 
of  view  of  religion,  reduced,  not  only  to  nudity,  but  to  nihiHty. 
The  poor  man  retains  nothing,  not  even  so  much  as  a  shadow. 
He  is  a  Peter  Schlemil,  and  has  sold  his  shadow  to  the  man  in 
black.  What  can  have  reduced  him  to  such  straits, — driven 
him  to  such  extremes?  Love  of  truth,  force  of  conviction? 
Nothing  of  the  sort.  Be  not  so  simple  as  to  pretend  it.  He 
assigns,  and  attempts  to  assign,  no  authority,  no  reason,  for  his 
nihihsm.  He  even  acknowledges  that  he  has  no  reason  to  as- 
sign, and  tells  you  that  he  only  throws  out  what  he  thinks, 


PROTESTAXTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  243 

without  pretending  to  prove  it.  He  is  a  seer,  and  utters  what  he 
sees,  and  you  must  take  him  at  his  word,  or  not  at  ah.  Why, 
then,  does  he  rush  into  nihihsm  ?  vSimply,  because  he  is  seer 
enough  to  see,  that,  if  he  admits  that  anything  exist,  he  will 
be  driven  ultimately  to  acknowledge  the  truth  of  Catholicity. 
Rather  than  do  that,  he  will  sell  his  soul,  as  well  as  his  shadow, 
to  the  man  in  black,  and  consent  to  deny  his  own  existence. 
Almost  every  day,  we  meet  intelligent  Protestant  gentlemen 
who  frankly  acknowledge  that  there  is  no  alternative  but  Cath- 
olicity or  no-religion,  and  yet  who  just  as  frankly  tell  us  that  they 
will  not  be  Catholics.  Not  long  since,  a  Protestant  minister  of 
respectable  standing  in  this  city  assured  us,  in  all  seriousness, 
that  he  "  would  rather  be  damned  than  become  a  Catholic." 
We  of  course  informed  him  that  he  could  have  his  choice,  for 
Almighty  God  forces  no  one  to  accept  the  gift  of  eternal  life. 
This  worthy  minister  is,  no  doubt,  very  ready  to  embrace  the 
truth  that  does  not  convict  him  of  error,  if  such  truth  there  be ; 
but  if  we  may  take  him  at  his  word,  he  is  prepared  to  resist,  at 
all  hazards,  the  truth  that  would  indict  him.  Is  it  truth,  or  his 
own  opinion  that  he  loves  ? 

The  mistake  of  our  popular  controversialists  seems  to  arise 
from  their  supposition,  that  Protestantism  can  be  learned  from 
the  svmbolical  books  and  theoloo-ical  writino;s  of  Protestants. 
Undoubtedly  we  can  thus  learn  that  Protestantism  which  is  put 
forth  to  elude  Catholicity,  or  to  lure  Catholics  from  their  Church, 
and  therefore  a  Protestantism  highly  important,  for  the  sake 
of  Cathohcs,  to  be  studied  and  refuted ;  but  not  thus  can  we 
learn  the  Protestantism  which  lies  in  the  Protestant  mind  and 
heart,  and  which  it  is  necessary  to  refute  for  the  sake  of  Prot- 
estants themselves.  This  Protestantism  is  not  learned  from 
symbolical  books  or  theological  writings,  and  but  comparatively 
few  Protestants  themselves  can  give  us  a  clear  and  distinct 
statement,  much  less  a  just  account  of  it.  We  can  seize  it  only 
in  the  historical  developments  and  manifest  tendencies  of  the 
Protestant  movement,  and  explain  it  only  by  means  of  a  thor- 


244  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A.    NUTSHELL. 

oiio-li  knowleclo-e  of  liiiman  niituie  on  the  one  hand,  and  of 
CathoHc  faith  and  theology  on  the  other. 

It  appears  to  us,  that  our  controversiahsts  are  mistaken,  also, 
in  regarding  the  more  reputable  sects — that  is,  the  sects  which, 
in  their  symbols  and  professions,  have  departed  the  least  from 
the  Catholic  standard — as  better  exponents  of  the  Protestant 
mind  than  the  less  reputable,  and  as  those  whose  views  it  is 
the  most  important  to  study  and  refute.  Nearly  all  the  con- 
troversial works  we  have,  originally  written  in  the  English  lan- 
guage, are  directed  against  the  Anglican  and  Protestant  Epis- 
copal sects.  We  are  not  aware  of  a  single  Catholic  work,  writ- 
ten expressly  against  the  so-called  Evangelical  sects,  Presby- 
terians, Baptists,  Methodists,  or  what  we  may  call  Pietism. 
And,  with  the  exception  of  the  profound  and  scientific  work  of 
Father  Kollmann,  against  Unitarians, — too  profound  and  scien- 
tific to  be  intelligible  to  those  for  whom  it  was  written, — we 
have  in  English  not  a  single  work  against  Rationalism,  which, 
in  reality,  has  a  larger  number  of  adherents,  in  both  England 
and  this  country,  than  either  Anglicanism  or  Evangelicalism. 
This  indicates  a  serious  defect  in  our  controversial  literature,  and 
seems  to  us  to  be  owing  to  a  false  estimate  of  the  relative  im- 
portance of  the  several  Protestant  sects.  There  are,  no  doubt, 
many  individuals  included  in  the  more  reputable  sects,  who,  if 
compelled  to  choose,  would  sooner  return  to  the  Church  than 
follow  the  Proiestant  movement  to  its  natural  terminus ;  but  they 
are  only  a  small  minority,  and  would  hardly  be  missed  in  the 
sects  to  which  they  respectively  belong.  All  the  sects  are  on 
the  move,  tending  somewhither.  Not  one  of  them  is  stationary. 
This  they  make  their  boast ;  and  one  of  the  most  frequent  and 
most  effective  charges  they  bring  against  the  Church  is,  that  she 
is  not  progressive,  but  remains  immovable,  insisting  that  we  shall 
believe  to-day  the  very  doctrines  which  she  taught  and  beheved 
in  the  Dark  Ages.  The  dominant  tendency  of  any  given  sect 
is  the  tendency  which  the  great  majority  of  its  members  obey. 
Ascertain,  then,  the  dominant  tendency  of  each  sect,  and  you 
have  ascertained  the  direction  in  which  the  great  majority  of  its 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  245 

members  are  moving,  and  will  continue  to  move,  if  diverted  or 
arrested  by  no  foreign  influence.  But  what,  in  fact,  is  the  dom- 
inant tendency  of  each  and  every  Protestant  sect  ?  Is  there  a  sin- 
gle one  whose  successive  developments,  modifications,  and  changes 
tend  to  bring  it  nearer  and  nearer  to  the  Cathohc  standard,  and 
to  prepare  it  for  communion  with  the  Church  ?  Nobody  can 
pretend  it.  Everybody  knows  that  every  sect  is  moving  in  the 
opposite  direction,  and  that  the  dominant  tendency  of  the  Prot 
estant  world,  a  few  individuals  excepted,  is  towards  Rationalism, 
Transcendentalism,  and  therefore  towards  pantheism,  atheism, 
nihihsm.  This  is  decisive,  and  proves  that  those  sects  which 
have  departed  farthest  from  Catholicity  are  the  truest  reprenta- 
tives  of  the  Protestant  spirit,  and  the  best  exponents  of  genuine 
Protestantism,  as  the  fully  developed  man  is  a  better  exponent 
of  humanity  than  the  new-born  infant.  What  it  is  most  im- 
portant, then,  to  study  and  refute,  must  be  the  principles  of 
these  more  advanced  sects,  not  those  of  the  sects  who  remain 
behind,  or  are  still  rocking  in  their  cradle,  and  therefore  Trans- 
cendentalism, rather  than  Anglicanism. 

Undoubtedly  we  see,  from  time  to  time,  a  conservative,  per- 
haps a  retrogade,  movement  in  the  bosom  of  the  several  sects. 
But  this  movement  is  the  result,  in  most  cases,  of  alarm  for  the 
credit  or  prosperity  of  the  sect,  rather  than  of  any  deep  or  sin- 
cere attachment  to  the  principles  or  doctrines  the  sect  threatens 
to  leave  behind.  Besides,  the  movement  is  ever  but  a  mere 
eddy  in  the  stream,  or  a  slight  ripple  on  its  surface.  It  reaches 
never  to  the  bottom  of  the  sect,  and  arrests  or  diverts  never  its 
main  current.  This  is  evident  from  the  late  Oxford  movement, 
one  of  the  most  important  movements  of  the  kind  which  has 
recently  been  witnessed.  There  was  a  time  when  timid  Prot- 
estants feared,  and  many  good  Catholics  hoped,  that  it  would 
restore  England  to  Catholic  faith  and  unity ;  but  no  sooner  did 
it  become  manifest  to  all  the  world  that  its  tendency  was  to 
communion  with  Rome,  than  it  was  arrested.  A  few  individuals 
became  reconciled  to  the  Church,  but  the  majority  of  those  at 
first  favorably  disposed  towards  it  avowedly  or  tacitly  abandoned 


246  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

it,  lapsed  into  the  ordinary  channel  of  their  sect,  and  suffered 
themselves  to  be  borne  onward  with  it  towards  its  natural  term, 
-—no-religion,  or  nihilism.  So  it  is  in  every  sect  in  which  a  sim- 
ilar movement  takes  place.  As  soon  as  it  is  clear  that  its  ten- 
dency is  anti-Protestant,  that  is,  towards  Rome,  it  is  arrested, 
and  only  here"  and  there  an  individual  dares  henceforth  avow 
his  adherence  to  it. 

It  may  be  thought  by  some,  that  the  more  reputable  sects 
are  the  real  bulwarks  of  Protestantism,  and  that,  if  we  refute 
thern,  the  less  reputable  sects  will  fall  of  themselves.  Doubtless 
this  is  one  reason  why  our  English  and  American  Catholic  con- 
troversialists direct  their  attacks  so  exclusively  against  Anglican- 
ism and  Protestant  Episcopalianism.  But  we  are  disposed  to 
believe  that  the  real  supportei's  of  Protestantism,  if  not  in  them- 
selves, at  least  in  their  views  and  influence,  are  the  sects  which 
are  farthest  removed  from  Catholicity.  If  there  was  nothing  be- 
low Anglicanism  to  which  Anglicans  could  descend,  we  should 
have  short  work  with  it,  and  the  Anglican  and  Episcopal  sects 
would  soon  disappear.  The  more  reputable  sects,  comparing 
themselves  with  the  immense  Protestant  world  below  them,  look 
upon  themselves  as  substantially  orthodox,  and  are  more  dis{)os- 
ed  to  dwell  on  what  they  retain  that  otliers  have  given  up,  than 
on  what  they  themselves  lack  which  we  have.  They  form,  too, 
a  sort  of  aristocracy,  a  haute  noblesse,  in  the  sectarian  world,  and 
are  pleased  with  their  rank,  and  unwilling  to  forego  the  import- 
ance it  gives  them  in  their  own  eyes.  Moreover,  the  sects  be- 
low them,  all  Protestant,  and  of  their  own  race,  smooth  the  de- 
scent for  them  in  proportion  as  they  are  driven  from  their  more 
elevated  position,  and  enable  them  to  descend  by  an  easy  grada- 
tion, by  almost  imperceptible  steps,  to  the  lowest  depths  of 
error.  If  the  High-churchman  is  defeated,  he  can  descend  to 
Low-churchism  ;  if  the  Low^-churchman  is  defeated,  he  can  de- 
scend to  Evangelicalism  ;  if  the  Evangelical  is  defeated,  he  can 
descend  either,  on  the  one  hand,  to  Rationalism,  or,  on  the  other, 
to  Transcendentalism, — for,  in  point  of  fact.  Evangelicalism  is 
nothing  but  a  loose  combination  of  Rationalism  and  Transcend- 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  247 

entalism.  It  is  for  ecosier  for  a  High-churchman  to  become  a 
Low-churchman  than  it  is  for  him  to  become  a  Cathohc,  and 
always  is  the  next  step  in  the  descending  scale  far  easier  to  take 
than  the  next  step  in  the  ascending  scale. 

"  Facilis  descensus  Averno : 
Noctes  atque  dies  patet  atri  janua  Ditis; 
Sed  revocare  gradum  superasque  evadere  ad  auras. 
Hoc  opus,  hie  labor  est." 

As  long  as  there  is  a  lower  step  that  can  be  taken  without 
abandoning  the  essential  element  of  Protestantism,  the  defeat  of 
the  more  reputable  sects,  on  the  ground  they  profess  to  occupy, 
will  do  little  for  their  convei-sion ;  for  they  will  never  acknowl- 
edge, even  to  themselves,  that  they  are  defeated,  so  long  as  there 
is  any  conceivable  Protestant  ground  fi'om  which  they  are  not 
actually  driven.  It  is  owing  to  the  fact  that  Protestants  now 
claim  as  Protestant  all  the  territory  between  the  ground  occupi- 
ed by  Dr.  Pusey  and  that  occupied  by  M.  Proudhon,  and  thus 
have  a  laro'er  field  for  advance  or  retreat,  that  we  find  their  con- 
version  in  our  times  so  much  more  difficult  thjui  it  was  formerly. 
St.  Francis  of  Sales,  Bishop  of  Geneva,  himself  alone  regain- 
ed seventy-two  thousand  Protestants  to  the  Church;  we  are 
aware  of  no  bishop  in  the  present  age,  however  zealous,  learned, 
able,  or  saintly,  who  has  the  consolation  of  recovering  anything 
approaching  a  like  number.  We  cannot,  therefore,  but  regard 
tlie  views  and  tendencies  of  the  more  advanced  sects  as  those 
which  it  is  now  altogether  the  most  important  to  study  and 
refute 

Not  only  does  Protestantism,  -as  our  divines  have  from  the 
first  maintained,  logically  lead  to  the  denial  of  all  religion,  to 
atheism,  and  therefore  to  nihilism, — for  to  deny  that  God  exists 
is  to  deny  that  anything  is,— but  it  is  now  clear  to  all  who  have 
examined  the  subject,  that  the  gi-eat  body  of  Protestants  are 
really  prepared,  as  occasion  may  require,  to  follow  it  thus  far. 
The  majority  of  the  Protestant  world  are  really,  if  not  avowedly, 
Transcendentalists  to-day,  as  every  one  knows  who  is  acquainted 


248  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

with  recent  Protestant  literature  ;  and  Sti  aiiss,  Feiierbach,  Bauer, 
Parker,  Emerson,  Michelet,  Quinet,  and  Proudhon  have  more 
syrapatliizers  than  Hengstenberg,  Pusey,  Seabury,  Nevin,  Alex- 
ander, Beecher,  and  Kirk.  Proudhon  is  nothing  but  a  consist- 
ent Red  Republican ;  and  where  is  the  Protestant,  in  case  he  is 
not  restrained  by  his  temporal  interest,  who  does  not  sympathize 
with  Red  Republicanism  ?  Have  not  Protestants  very  generally, 
in  England  and  this  country,  sympathized  ,with  Mazzini  and  his 
Roman  Republic?  Nay,  was  it  not  in  concert  with,  and  by  aid 
e\'en  of,  the  more  reputable  Protestant  sects,  that  he  expelled 
the  Sovereign  Pontiff,  and  established  his  Reign  of  Terror  ?  Is 
not  Protestant  sympathy  very  generally  enlisted  in  favor  of  the 
infidel  and  socialistic  revolutions  in  Europe,  all  of  which  have 
been  stirred  up  and  hel]:)ed  on  by  Protestants,  under  the  lead 
of  their  ministers,  in  the  name  of  liberty,  but  really  for  the  pur- 
pose of  overthrowing  and  annihilating  the  Church  ?  Evident  is 
it,  then,  that  they  will  go,  as  a  body,  to  all  lengths  which  they 
find  necessary  to  accomplish  their  purpose  of  hostility  to  Catho- 
licity ;  and  as  they  never  can  even  logically  overthrow  the 
Church,  so  long  as  the  existence  of  anything  is  admitted,  they 
must  deny  everything,  and  rush  into  nihilism. 

It  is  necessary,  then,  if  we  wish  to  arrest  the  Protestant  move- 
ment, and  do  what  in  us  lies  to  save  the  souls  of  Protestants, 
that  we  reason  with  them,  not  as  if  it  were  a  sufficient  refutation 
of  them  to  prove  that  they  are  tending  to  atheism,  but  as  men 
who  believe  nothing,  and  build  up  our  argument  against  them 
from  the  very  foundation.  I'rove  to  them  that  their  doctrines 
are  anti-Christian,  and  they  will  only  beg  you  to  inform  them 
wherefore  that  is  a  reason  for  not  believing  them  ;  prove  Chris- 
tianity to  be  true,  and  they  will  merely  beg  you  to  prove  your 
proofs,  and  thus  demand  of  you  an  infinite  series  of  proofs. 
They  are,  under  the  point  of  view  of  religion  and  philosophy, 
wholly  rotten,  and  from  the  sole  of  the  foot  to  the  crown  of  the 
head  there  is  no  soundness  in  them.  Nothing  will  answer  for 
them  that  does  not  descend  as  low  as  the  last  denial  that  it  is 
possible  for  the  human  mind  to  conceive,  and  drive  them  from 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  249 

position  to  position,  till  tliere  is  no  position  remaining  outside  of 
the  Church  which  they  can  even  aftect  to  take. 

Protestantism  as  we  now  find  it,  and  even  as  it  was,  virtually, 
in  the  sixteenth  century,  is  not  merely  the  denial  of  certain  Ca- 
tholic dogmas,  is  not  merely  the  denial  of  the  Christian  revela- 
tion itself,  but  really  the  denial  of  all  religion  and  morality,  na- 
tural and  revealed.  It  denies  reason  itself,  as  far  as  it  is  in  the 
j)ower  of  man  to  deny  it,  and  is  no  less  unsound  as  philosophy 
than  it  is  as  faith.  It  extinguishes  the  light  of  nature  no  less 
than  the  light  of  revelation,  and  is  as  false  in  relation  to  the  na- 
tural order  as  to  the  supernatural.  Even  when  Protestants 
make  a  profession  of  believing  in  revelation,  they  discredit  rea- 
son. In  regard  to  reason,  they  are,  even  when  professing  to 
believe,  very  generally  Pyrrhonists.  The  Evano^elical  sects,  for 
instance,  do  not  merely  deny  the  sufficiency  of  reason  as  our 
only  guide,  but  they  deny  its  trustworthiness  altogether,  and  as- 
sert that  we  must  take  for  our  guide  the  Scriptures,  not  as  in- 
tevpreted  by  an  authority  accredited  to  reason,  nor  as  interpret- 
ed by  reason  itself,  but  as  interpreted  by  the  private  illuminations 
of  the  spirit.  They  thus  supersede,  as  it  were,  annihilate,  rea- 
son, and  reduce  themselves  to  the  condition  of  irrational  beings, 
virtually  declare  man  incapable  of  receiving  a  supernatural  reve- 
lation, and  then  call  upon  him  to  believe  the  Bible,  and  to  walk 
by  the  supernatural^ light  of  faith.  As  long  as  their  enthusiasm 
lasts,  as  long  as  they  can  keep  up  a  sort  of  unnatural  excitement, 
they  may  half  persuade  themselves  that  they  are  supernatu rally 
illuminated  ;  but  as  soon  as  their  fever  abates,  and  they  sink  to 
their  ordinary  level,  they  experience  the  most  painful  misgivings, 
the  su])posed  supernatural  light  fades  away,  and,  having  no  rea- 
son on  which  to  fall  back,  they  can  believe  nothing,  and  either 
openly  avow  themselves  infidels,  or,  merely  keep  up  a  show 
of  piety,  seek  relief  by  devoting  all  their  energies  to  worldly  dis- 
tinctions or  pleasures.  They  begin  by  proposing  revelation,  not 
as  the  complement,  but  as  the  substitute,  of  reason  ;  and  when 
revelation  fails,  as  fail  it  must    f  not  supported  by  motives  of 


250  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

credilnlity  addressed  to  reason,  and  satisfactory  to  it,  nothing  re- 
mains for  tliein  but  universal  ske[>ticism. 

The  formaUstic  sects,  as  the  Anghcan  and  Episcopalian,  reach 
the  same  result  though  by  a  different  process.  Building  on 
sham,  taking  the  shadow  for  the  substance,  and  denying  both 
the  substance  and  the  light  the  shadow  necessarily  implies,— or, 
in  other  words,  refusing  to  draw  from  their  premises  their  logical 
consequences,  afraid  to  make  a  complete  proposition,  to  say  two 
and  two  make  four,  and  stopping  short  with  saying  two  and  two, 
lest  they  lose  the  via  media,  and  roll  over  to  Rome,  or  fell  off  into 
Dissent,— they  destroy  reason  by  mutilating  and  enslaving  it,  and 
find  themselves  without  anything  by  or  to  which  a  supernatural 
revelation  can  be  accredited.  The  Rationalistic  sects,  seeing  the 
errors  of  Evangelicals  and  formalists,  think  to  save  reason  by 
resolving  the  supernatural  into  the  natural ;  but  in  doing  this 
they  lose  revelation,  and  therefore  reason, — because  no  man  can 
deny  revelation  without  denying  reason,  and  because  reason 
without  revelation  is  insufficient  for  herself,  inadequate  to  the 
solution  of  the  great  problems  of  life  which  she  herself  raises. 
Beginning  by  asking  of  reason  more  than  she  can  give,  they 
end  by  disci\rding  her  and  foiling  into  universal  skepticism,  the 
ultimate  term  of  all  Protestantism. 

Protestants,  it  is  well  known,  are  able  to  keep  up  the  self- 
delusion  that  they  are  believers  only  by  obstinately  refusing  to 
push  their  principles  to  their  legitimate  consequences,  and  by 
shutting  their  eyes  to  the  objections  which  may  be  suggested  or 
urged  against  them.  The  condition  of  a  Protestant  wishing  to 
retain  his  Protestantism,  and  yet  keep  up  the  ap];)earance  of  being 
a  believer,  is  most  pitiable.  The  poor  man  has  no  mental  freedom, 
no  intellectual  courage,  but  is  a  cowardly  slave,  with  all  the 
weakness  and  meanness  characteristic  of  slaves  in  general.  He 
never  dares  trust  himself  to  his  principles,  and  follow  them  out 
to  their  remotest  logical  consequences,  and  is  doomed,  turn 
which  way  he  will,  to  be  inconsequent,  and  to  submit  to  a  most 
tyrannical  and  capricious  master ;  for  otherwise  he  would  find 
himself,  on  the  one  hand,  approaching  too  near  Catholicity  to 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  251 

remain  a  Protestant,  or,  on  the  other,  too  near  to  nihilism  to 
even  pretend  to  be  a  believer.  Alas  for  the  poor  man !  He 
hugs  his  chains,  and,  by  the  strangest  infatuation  imaginable, 
fancies  his  slavery  is  freedom.  All  who  have  studied  the  subject 
know  well  that  Protestants  are  Protestants,  not  by  virtue  of  rea- 
son, but  in  spite  of  reason, — not  because  they  reason,  but  solely 
because  they  do  not,  will  not,  and  dare  not  reason.  The  rejec- 
tion of  reason  is  their  fundamental  vice.  Pieason  is  our  natural 
hght,  and,  though  of  no  value  out  of  its  sphere,  in  its  sphere  is 
inerrable.  It  does  not  suffice  of  itself  for  all  the  wants  of  the 
human  soul,  but  its  annihilation  reduces  us  below  the  condition 
of  men,  and  renders  us  incapable  of  receiving  even  a  superna- 
tural revelation.  Revelation  does  not  abrogate  or  supersede 
reason ;  it  restores  it  and  supplies  its  deficiencies.  Grace  sup- 
poses nature.  Christianity  is  a  system  of  pure  grace, — is,  in 
fact,  a  supernatural  creation,  but  a  supernatural  creation  for  the 
natural,  designed  to  repair  the  damage  nature  has  incurred  by 
guilt,  and  to  enable  man  to  attain  the  end  to  which  his  Creator 
originally  appointed  him.  Man  is  not  for  the  Sacraments,  but 
the  Sacraments  are  for  man.  The  first  office  of  grace  is  to  re- 
store nature,  or  to  heal  its  wounds  ;  having  restored  it  to  health, 
it  elevates  it,  indeed,  but  always  retains  it,  and  uses  it.  Here  is 
the  grand  fact  that  Protestant  theologians  always  overlook. 
They,  in  reality,  always  present  nature  and  grace  as  two  antag- 
onistic powers,  and  suppose  the  presence  of  the  one  must  be  the 
physical  destruction  of  the  other.  Luther  and  Calvin,  weary  of 
the  good  works,  and  shrinking  from  the  efforts  to  acquire  the 
personal  virtues  enjoined  by  Catholicity,  began  their  so-called 
reform  by  asserting  the  total  depravity  of  human  nature,  and 
maintaining  that  original  sin  invol\'ed  the  loss  of  reason  and  free- 
will, reducing  man  physically  to  the  condition  of  irrational  ani- 
mals, and  superadding  the  penalty  of  guilt.  Here,  in  the  very 
outset,  they  denied  natural  reason,  all  natural  religion,  and  all 
natural  morality,  and  consequently  asserted  for  man  in  the  natu- 
ral order,  left  to  his  natural  powers  and  faculties,  universal  skep- 
ticism and  moral  indifference ;  for  without  reason  there  can  be 


252  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

no  belief,  and  without  free-will  no  moral  obligation,  no  moral  dif- 
ference of  actions. 

The  Arminians,  indeed,  saw  this,  and  sought  to  remedy  it  by 
reasserting  the  natural  law ;  but  as  they  still  held  to  total  de- 
pravity, the  reassertion  amounted  to  nothing ;  or,  if  they  some- 
times abandoned  total  depravity,  they  rushed  to  the  opposite 
extreme,  and  reasserted  Pelagianism  or  semi-Pel agianism,  and 
restricted  the  office  of  grace  to  enabling  us  to  do  more  easily 
what,  nevertheless,  we  are  able  to  do  without  it.  If  they  suc- 
ceeded in  escaping  the  peculiar  error  of  Luther  and  Calvin,  they 
fell  into  Rationalism.  As  Luther  and  Calvin  annihilated  reason 
and  free-will,  the  whole  spiritual  nature  of  man,  and  made  man 
purely  passive  in  the  woi'k  of  regeneration  and  Christian  per- 
fection, the  Arminians,  become  Rationalists,  disregarding  the  ne- 
cessity of  grace,  made  the  natural  law  sufficient,  and  asserted 
only  a  natural  morality.  But  experience  proving  the  inadequa- 
cy of  the  natural  law,  when  taken  without  its  revealed  comple- 
ment and  sanction, — of  natural  morality,  when  not  elevated  by 
supernatural  Christian  virtue, — they,  like  the  othei*s,  lapsed,  of 
necessity,  into  the  same  skepticism. 

The  error  of  each  class  is  avoidable  only  by  understanding 
that  grace  always  supposes  nature,  and  that  grace  without  na- 
ture would  be  as  a  telescope  to  a  man  without  eyes.  Revela- 
tion supposes  reason,  and  we  as  effectually  deny  Christianity 
when  we  deny  reason  as  when  we  deny  revelation ;  both  must 
be  asserted  with  equal  firmness  and  emphasis,  each  in  its  own 
sphere,  in  relation  to  its  appropriate  office,  or  nothing  is  asserted. 
To  deny  reason  is,  a  fortiori^  to  deny  revelation,  and  to  deny 
revelation  is  virtually  to  deny  reason  ;  because  the  evidences  of 
the  fact  of  revelation  are  amply  sufficient  to  satisfy  reason,  and 
because  reason,  without  revelation,  being  undeniably  insufficient 
to  solve  the  problems  which  torture  the  mind  without  faith,  and 
to  satisfy  the  craving  of  our  nature  for  something  above  itself, 
cannot  maintain  itself  practically  in  credit,  and  necessarily  loses 
its  authority.  Philosophy,  undoubtedly,  rests  for  its  basis  on 
natural  reason,  otherwise  we  should  be  unable  to  distinguish  it 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  253 

from  Catholic  theology,  or  to  draw  any  intelligible  distinction 
between  the  natural  and  supernatural ;  but  without  the  light  of 
revelation,  we  shall  never  be  able,  in  our  fallen  condition,  to 
construct  a  sound  and  adequate  philosophy.  So,  on  the  other 
hand,  without  a  sound  and  adequate  philosophy,  we  can  never 
possess  a  true  and  adequate  theology  ;  for  as  revelation  is  neces- 
sary as  an  instrument  in  the  construction  of  philosoi)hy,  so  is 
philosophy  necessary  as  an  instrument  in  the  construction  of 
theology, — that  is,  theology  as  a  science,  and  as  distinguishable 
from  faith.  Hence,  in  all  courses  of  Catholic  instruction,  the 
student  makes  his  philosophy  before  he  proceeds  to  his  theology. 
It  is  clear  enough,  from  what  we  have  said,  that  the  most 
pressing  want  of  Protestants,  under  the  intellectual  point  of 
view,  is  a  sound  philosophy,  which,  so  to  speak,  shall  rehabilitate 
reason,  and  restore  them  to  natural  religion  and  morality.  They 
have  lost  reason,  and  have  fallen  below  the  religion  or  morahty 
which  lies  in  the  natural  order,  and  which  all  revealed  religion 
and  morality  presuppose.  The  philosophy  needed  is  nowhere 
to  be  found  in  the  Protestant  world,  and  cannot  possibly  be 
created  by  Protestants,  for  the  reason  that  the  revelation  which 
must  serve  as  its  instrument  they  have  not,  or  at  best  only  some 
detached  fragments  of  it.  The  only  respectable  school  of  philos- 
ophy to  be  found  amongst  Protestants  is  the  Scottish  School  of 
Reid  and  Stewart ;  but  this  school  dogmatizes  rather  than  phi- 
losophizes. It  very  justly  assumes  that  all  philosophy  must 
proceed  from  certain  indemonstrable  principles,  and  it  does  not 
err  essentially  in  its  inventory  of  these  principles  ;  but  it  fails  to 
establish  them,  or  to  show  us  that  they  have  scientific  validity. 
It  calls  them  the  constituent  principles  of  human  belief,  and 
says,  very  truly,  that  they  must  be  admitted,  or  all  science,  all 
philosophy,  is  out  of  the  question.  But  this  is  no  more  than 
Hume,  whom  it  aims  to  refute,  himself  said.  Is  science  or  phi- 
losophy possible  ?  is  the  precise  question  to  be  answered. 
Without  the  conditions  you  assert,  we  grant  it  is  not  possible  ; 
but  what  then  ?  Therefore  your  alleged  principles  are  sound  ? 
Why  not :     Therefore  all  science,  all  philosophy,  is  impossible  ? 


254  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

No  doubt,  the  Scottish  School  has  protested  vehemently  against 
the  skepticism  of  Hume,  but  its  refutation  of  that  skepticism  is 
a  mere  paralogism,  a  simple  begging  of  the  question,  and  there- 
fore, scientifically  considered,  worthless.  * 

But,  after  all,  we  cannot  place  our  chief  reliance  on  philoso- 
phy as  an  instrument  in  the  conversion  of  Protestants.  Philos- 
ophy is  too  indirect  and  too  slow  in  its  operations  to  meet  their 
wants.  They  are  too  far  gone,  too  restless,  too  impatient,  too 
averse  to  calm  reflection  and  continuous  thought,  to  listen  to 
us  while  we  set  the  true  philosophy  before  them,  or  to  sub- 
mit to  the  labor  absolutely  requisite  to  comprehend  and  aj-^pre- 
ciate  profound  philosophical  science.  An  age  of  balloons,  steam- 
cai-s,  and  lightning  telegraphs  is  not  exactly  the  age  for  philos- 
ophers. Moreover,  Protestant  perversity  would  find  in  the 
necessity  of  the  long  and  patient  thought,  and  close  and  subtile 
reasoning,  demanded  by  philosophy,  an  objection  to  our  rehgion 
itself.  Your  religion,  they  would  say,  if  true,  is  intended  for 
all  mankind,  and  therefore  should  be  within  the  reach  of  every 
capacit}^  The  thought  and  reasoning  necessary  to  create  or 
understand  the  philosophy  you  insist  upon,  transcend  the  capa- 
city of  all  but  the  gifted  few,  and  therefore,  if  necessary  to  estab- 
lish 3'our  religion,  prove  that  your  religion  is  not  true.  We 
might,  indeed,  reply,  that  the  thought  and  reasoning  objected  to 
are  necessary  to  refute  the  errors  of  Protestants,  not  simply  to 
establish  our  religion ;  but  that  would  amount  to  nothing  in 
practice.  The  nature  of  the  Protestant  is  to  devise  the  most 
subtile  errors  in  his  power,  and  to  find  an  objection  to  our  relig- 
ion in  the  very  labor  he  makes  necessary  for  their  refutation. 
When  he  objects,  he  may  be  as  subtile  and  as  abstruse  as  he 
pleases  ;  but  when  we  reply,  he  insists  that  we  shall  be  popular, 
and  never  go  beyond  the  depth  of  the  most  ordinary  capacity, — 
that  we  shall  answer  the  objection  not  only  to  the  mind  that 
raises  it,  but  to  the  minds  of  all  men.  Only  the  candid  among 
Protestants  would  acknowledge  the  justness  of  our  reply,  and 
these  would  fail  to  comprehend  it ;  for  if  you  find  a  candid 
Protestant,  you  may  safely  conclude  that  he  lacks  intelligence, 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  255 

as  when  you  find  an  intelligent  Protestant  you  may  be  sure  that 
he  lacks  candor.  There  must,  then,  be  some  briefer  and  more 
expeditious  way  of  dealing  with  Protestants  than  that  of  philoso- 
phy, if  we  wish  to  alfect  theui  favorably. 

We  have  defined  Protestantism  to  be  hostility  to  the  Church, 
and  virtually  nihilism,   because  Protestants  in  general,  sooner 
than  return  to  the  Church  will  push  their  hostility  to  its  last 
consequence,  which  is  the  denial  of  God,  therefore  of  all  exist- 
ence and  existences.     But  this  is  not  all  that  we  have  to  say  of 
the  matter.     No  man  loves  error  for  its  own  sake,  or  wills  what 
does  not  appear  to  him  to  be  good.     The  natural  heart  of  every 
man  recoils  instinctively  from  atheism  ;  and  it  is  seldom,  if  ever, 
that  one  without  a  fearful  and  even  a  protracted  struggle  aband- 
ons all  faith  and  piety,  resigns  all  hope  of  an  hereafter,  and  con- 
sents to  place  himself  in  the  category  of  the  beasts  that  perish. 
Hatred,  no  doubt,  will  carry  a  man  to  great  lengths ;  but  even 
hatred  must  have  its  cause,  real  or  imaginary.     Hatred  is  love 
reversed,  and  intense  hatred  of  one  thing  is  the  reverse  action 
of  intense  love  of  something  else.     Protestants  hate  the  Church. 
Wherefore?     Because  they  love  truth?     Nonsense.     Because 
they  believe  her  false,  and  destructive  to  the  souls  of  men  ?    Non- 
sense again.     We  hope  there  is  no  CathoHc  so  stupid  as  to  be- 
lieve it.     Their  hatred  of  the  Church  has  nothing  to  do  with 
concern  for  truth  or  for  salvation.     A  large  portion  of  them  be- 
heve  in  no  truth,  in  no  salvation ;   a  larger  portion  still  are  of 
opinion  that  all  men  will  be  saved,  and  that  truth  is  whatever 
seems  to  a  man  to  be  true ;  and  the  remainder  hold  that  the 
Church  is  substantially  orthodox,  and  that  salvation  is  attainable 
in  her  communion,  as  well  as  in  their  own.     WTiatever,  then, 
the  cause  of  their  hatred  of  the  Church,  it  is  a  cause  uncon- 
nected with  considerations  of  another  world,  or  with  truth  as 
such. 

We  need  not  look  far  for  this  something  which  Protestants 
love  and  the  Church  condemns,  and  for  condemning  which  they 
are  full  of  wrath  against  her.  It  is  nothing  very  recondite,  or 
very  difficult  to  seize.     We  make  quite  too  much  of  Protestant- 


256  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

ism,  which  is,  in  reahty,  a  very  vulgar  thing,  and  Hes  altogether 
on  the  surface  of  life.  Protestantism  is  nothing  more  or  less 
than  that  spirit  of  lawlessness  which  leads  every  one  to  Avish  to 
have  his  own  way, — very  common  in  women  and  children,  iind 
perhaps  not  less  common  in  men,  only  they  have,  generally,  a 
better  faculty  of  concealing  it.  Objectively  defined,  it  is  expres- 
sed in  the  common  saying,  "Forbidden  fruit  is  sweetest;"  and 
subjectively,  it  is  a  craving  for  what  is  prohibited,  because  pro- 
hibited. It  imagines  that  the  sovereign  good  is  in  what  the  law 
foi'bids,  and  opposes  the  Church  because  she  upholds  the  law, 
— hates  the  law  because  the  law  restrains  it,  duty  because  duty 
obliges  it ;  and  since,  as  long  as  it  admits  the  existence  of  God, 
it  must  admit  duty,  it  denies  God ;  and  since,  as  long  as  it  ad- 
mits the  existence  of  anything,  it  must  admit  the  existence  of 
God,  it  denies  everything,  and  lapses  into  nihilism.  Here  is  the 
whole  mystery  of  the  matter, — Protestantism  in  a  nutshell. 

The  source  of  this  impatience  of  restraint,  and  this  desire  to 
have  one's  own  way,  is  the  pride  natural  to  the  human  heart, 
the  root  of  every  vice  and  of  every  sin.  "  Your  eyes  shall  be 
opened,  and  ye  shall  be  as  gods,  knowing  good  and  evil,"  said 
the  serpent  to  Eve ;  and  she  reached  forth  her  hand,  plucked  the 
forbidden  fruit,  ate,  and  sin  and  death  were  in  the  world.  Pride 
is,  on  the  one  hand,  a  denial  of  our  dependence,  and,  on  the 
other,  the  assertion  of  our  own  sufficiency.  Here  you  may  see 
the  oi-igin  and  the  essential  characteristic  of  Protestantism, 
which  is  as  old  as  the  first  motion  of  pride  or  of  resistance  to  the 
will  of  God.  Protestantism,  after  all,  is  more  ancient  than  we 
commonly  concede.  Dr.  Johnson,  in  his  Dictionary,  would 
have  been  as  correct  if  he  had  said  the  Devil  was  the  first  Prot- 
estant, as  he  was  in  saying  that  he  was  "  the  first  Whig."  It 
oflfends  pride  to  be  compelled  to  acknowledge  our  own  insuffici- 
ency, to  admit  that  we  cannot  be  trusted  to  follow  our  own  in- 
clinations, that  we  must  be  subjected  to  metes  and  bounds,  and 
placed  under  tutors  and  masters,  who  say.  Do  this.  Do  that ; 
and  we  are  galled,  and  we  resolve  we  will  not  endure  it ;  we  will 
break  the  withes  that  bind  us ;  we  will  stand  up  on  our  own 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  26*7 

two  feet,  and  assert  our  freedom  in  face  of  heaven,  earth  and  hell. 
Hence  we  see  Protestants,  in  every  age,  mounting  the  tallest  pair 
of  stilts  they  can  find  or  construct,  and  with  more  or  less  vehe- 
mence, with  more  or  less  eclat,  according  to  the  circumstances  of 
time  and  place,  magniloquently  asserting  the  "  inborn"  rights  of 
man,  proudly  swearing  to  be  free,  to  stand  up  in  their  native  dig- 
nity, in  the  full  and  resplendent  majesty  of  their  own  manhood, 
and  making  such  appeals  and  forming  such  alliances  as  they 
fancy  will  best  secure  their  independence,  reheve  them  from  all 
restraints,  and  give  them  the  opportunity  to  live  as  they  list. 

Such  is  the  general  and  essential  characteristic  of  Protestant- 
ism ;  its  particular  character  or  form  is  determined  by,  and  va- 
ries with,  the  circumstances  of  time  and  place.  In  itself,  as 
Balmes  well  shows,  it  is  a  phenomenon  peculiar  to  no  period  of 
history,  but  whatever  it  has  that  is  peculiar  it  borrows  from  the 
character  of  the  epoch  in  which  it  appears.  It  is  always  essen- 
tially the  spirit  that  works  in  the  children  of  disobedience,  but 
the  form  under  which  the  disobedience  manifests  itself  depends 
on  exterior  and  accidental  causes.  What  it  resists  is  what  it 
finds  oflfensive  to  human  pride,  to  pure,  unmitigated  egotism, 
and  what  it  asserts  is  always  asserted  as  the  means  of  secuiino- 
free  scope  to  its  independent  action.  In  the  sixteenth  century, 
pride  found  itself  galled  by  submission  to  the  Church,  for  the 
Church  could  not  tolerate  its  wild  speculations  and  its  theolog- 
ical errors.  It  then  denied  the  authority  of  the  Church ;  and 
in  order  to  make  a  show  of  justifying  its  denial,  it  asserted  the 
supremacy  of  the  Scriptures,  interpreted  by  private  reason,  or 
by  the  private  Spirit.  Soon  it  found  that  the  assertion  of  the 
supremacy  of  the  Scriptures,  so  interpreted,  limited  its  sove- 
reignty, and  that  it  was  as  galling  to  its  sense  of  independence 
to  submit  to  a  dead  book  as  to  a  living  Church,  and  then  it  de- 
nied the  Scriptures,  and,  to  justify  its  denial,  asserted  the  su- 
premacy of  reason.  But  reason,  again,  galled  it,  reminded  it 
of  its  dependence,  and  would  not  suffer  it  to  live  as  it  listed. 
Then  it  cried  out,  Down  with  reason,  and  up  with  sentiment ! — 
a   Transcendental    element   paramount   to   reason,— and   thus 


258  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

reached  the  juiriping-ofF  place.  In  order  to  resist  effectually 
the  Pope,  it  at  one  time,  as  in  England,  proclaims  the  divine 
right  of  kings ;  and  then,  in  order  to  get  rid  of  the  divine  right 
of  kings,  it  proclaims  the  divine  right  of  the  people,  or,  to  speak 
more  accurately,  of  the  mob ;  and  finally,  in  order  to  get  rid  of 
the  authority  of  the  mob,  it  proclaims  the  divine  right  of  each 
and  every  individual,  and  declares  that  each  and  every  individual 
is  God,  the  only  God, — thus  resolving  God  into  men,  and  all 
men  into  one  man,  which  implies  the  right  of  every  man  to  take 
the  cntii'e  universe  to  himself,  and  possess  it  as  his  own  property. 
You  laugh  at  its  absurdity  ?  Upon  our  conscience,  we  invent 
nothing,  we  exaggerate  nothing,  and  say  nothing  more  than  is 
asserted,  in  sober  earnest,  by  men  whom  the  Protestant  world 
delights  to  honor. 

Turn  Protestantism  over  as  you  will,  analyze  it  to  your  heai't's 
content,  you  can  make  nothing  more  or  less  of  it  than  mere 
vulgar  pride,  and  the  various  efforts  pride  makes  from  time  to 
time  and  place  to  place  to  secure  its  own  gratification,  to  realize 
the  assertion  of  the  serpent,  "  Ye  shall  be  as  gods  knowing  good 
and  evil," — that  is,  ye  shall  know  good  and  evil  of  yourselves, 
as  God  knows  them  of  himself,  and  shall  be  independent,  and 
act  as  seemeth  to  you  good,  even  as  God  is  independent  and 
doth  according  to  his  will,  not  as  subject  to  a  power  above  him- 
self, and  in  obedience  to  another  will  than  his  own.  Just  see 
the  ])roof  of  this,  in  the  sympathy  now  universally  given  to 
eveiy  revolt  against  established  authority.  All  your  modern 
litei'ature  is  Satanic,  and  approves,  and  teaches  us  to  approve, 
every  rebel,  whether  against  parental,  popular,  royal,  or  Divine 
authority.  The  Protestant  readers  of  Paradise  Lost  sympathize 
with  Lucifer,  in  his  war  against  the  Almighty,  and  if  they  had 
been  in  heaven,  as  one  of  our  friends  suggests,  would  have  sided 
with  him.  Our  friend,  J.  D.  Nourse,"^  defending  himself  against 
our  strictures  on  his  book,  boldly  asserts  that  God  is  a  despot, 
and  his  government  a  despotism, — nay,  that  all  authority  is 
despotic. 

*  See  below.     Authority  and  Liberty. 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  259 

Finding  the  essence  of  Protestantism  to  be  mere  vulgar  pride, 
that  it  is  a  moral  disease  rather  than  an  intellectual  aberration, 
it  is  evident  that  we  are  to  treat  it  as  a  vice  rather  than  as  an 
error,  and  Protestants  as  sinners  rather  than  as  simply  unbe- 
lievers or  misbehevers.  This  may  not  be  very  flattering  to  their 
pride ;  nevertheless,  it  is  the  only  way  they  deserve  to  be  treat- 
ed, and  the  only  way  in  which  they  can  be  treated  for  their 
good.  We  honor  them  quite  too  much  when  we  treat  them  as 
men  whose  heads  are  wrong,  but  whose  hearts  are  sound.  The 
wrongness  of  the  head  is  the  consequence  of  the  rottenness  of 
the  heart.  The  remedy  must  be  applied  to  the  seat  of  the  dis- 
ease, or  it  will  be  wholly  ineffectual ;  and  as  the  disease  is  in  the 
will  rather  than  in  the  intellect,  we  must,  as  w^e  do  with  sinners 
in  general,  avail  ourselves  of  motives  that  tend  to  persuade  the 
will,  rather  than  of  those  which  tend  primarily  to  convince  the 
understanding.  Get  the  heart  right,  and  the  intellect  will  soon 
rectify  itself. 

Now  it  is  certain,  that,  so  for  as  the  great  body  of  Protestants 
are  concerned,  it  is  of  no  use  to  appeal  to  any  love  of  truth  or 
regard  for  salvation  they  may  be  supposed  to  have.  They  are 
very  generally  prepared,  with  Macbeth,  "  to  jump  the  world  to 
come,"  and  think  only  how  they  shall  manage  matters  for  this 
world.  They  are  worldly,  and  their  wisdom  is  earthly,  sensual, 
devilish  ;  even  their  virtues,  their  honesty,  their  uprightness  of 
conduct,  have  reference,  not  to  God,  but  to  their  justification, 
either  in  the  eyes  of  the  world,  or  in  the  eyes  of  their  own  pride. 
They  are  too  proud  or  too  vain  to  do  this  or  that  act  which  is 
contrary  to  good  manners.  We  must  therefore  approach  them 
as  men  who  are  wedded  to  this  world,  who  are  Protestants  for 
the  sake  of  living  for  this  world  alone,  and  refuse  to  be  Catho- 
lics because  Catholicity  enjoins  humility,  detachment  from  the 
world,  and  a  life  of  self-denial  and  mortification,  hved  for  God 
alone.  As  long  as  it  is  conceded,  or  as  long  as  they  believe  it 
true,  that  their  Protestantism  is  more  favorable  to  man,  regarded 
solely  as  an  inhabitant  of  this  world,  than  Catholicity,  we  cannot 


2t50  PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL. 

get  them  to  listen  to  what  we  have  to  say  for  our  religion.     If 
they  hear,  it  will  be  as  if  they  heard  not. 

But  it  is  a  fact,  as  clearly  demonstrable,  in  its  way,  as  any 
mathematical  problem,  that  Catholicity  enjoins  the  only  normal 
life  for  man,  even  in  this  world,  letting  alone  what  it  secures  us 
in  another.  Human  pride  just  now  takes  the  form  of  Socialism, 
and  Socialism  is  the  Protestantism  of  our  times.  It  is  human 
pride  under  this  form  that  we  must  address,  and  show  to  the 
Socialists,  not — as  some  silly  and  misguided  creatures  calling 
themselves  Catholics,  and  sometimes  occupying  editorial  chairs, 
are  accustomed  to  do — that  Catholicity  favors  them  by  accept- 
ing their  Socialism,  but  that  it  favors  the  object  they  profess  to 
have  at  heart, — that  it  is  the  true  and  only  genuine  Socialism, 
the  basis  of  all  veritable  society,  and  the  only  known  instrument 
of  well-being,  either  for  the  individual  or  for  the  race.  We  must 
show,  that,  under  the  social  point  of  view,  under  the  various  re- 
lations of  civilization,  Protestantism  is  an  egregious  blunder,  and 
precipitates  its  adherents  into  the  precise  evils  they  really  wish 
to  avoid.  That  it  does  so  is  evident  enough  to  all  who  have 
eyes  to  see,  and  is  proved  by  the  very  complaints  Piotestants 
make  of  their  own  movements.  Their  own  complaints  of  them- 
selves show,  to  use  a  vulgar  proverb,  that  they  always  "jump 
from  the  frying-pan  into  the  fire,"  in  attempting  to  better  their 
condition.  They,  could  not  endure  the  authority  of  the  Church  ; 
they  resisted  it,  and  fell  under  the  tyranny  of  the  sect,  even  in 
their  own  view  of  the  case,  a  thousand  times  less  tolerable. 
They  rebelled,  in  the  name  of  liberty,  against  the  Pope,  and  fell 
under  the  iron  rule  of  the  civil  despot ;  in  England,  they  could 
not  endure  the  Lord's  bishops,  and  they  fell  under  the  Lord's 
presbyters,  and  from  Lord's  presbyters  under  the  Lord's  bi-ethren, 
and  from  Lord's  brethren  under  the  capricious  tyranny  of  their 
own  fancies  and  passions.  In  political  and  social  reforms  it  has 
fared  no  better  with  them.  In  France,  the  Constituante  were 
more  oppressive  than  the  old  monarchy,  the  Gironde  than  the 
Constituante^  the  Mountain  than  the  Gironde  ;  and  the  present 
French  government,  in  order  to  save  society  from  complete  des- 


PROTESTANTISM    IN    A    NUTSHELL.  261 

truction,  is  obliged  to  adopt  measures  more  stringent  than  ever 
Charles  the  Tenth  or  Louis  Phihppe  dared  venture  upon.  The 
overthrow  of  one  tyranny  leads  to  another  of  necessity  more 
heartless  and  oppressive,  because  weaker  and  possessing  a  less 
firm  hold  on  the  affections  of  the  people.  A  strong  goverament 
can  afford  to  be  lenient.  A  weak  government  must  be  stringent. 
Yet  the  wise  men  of  the  age  rush  on  in  their  wild-goose  chase 
after  worldly  felicity,  while  it  flies  ever  the  faster  before  them. 
Like  the  gambler,  who  has  played  away  his  patrimony,  his  wife's 
jewels,  and  pawned  his  hat  and  coat,  but  keeps  playing  on,  they 
insist  on  another  throw, — tliough  losing  all,  fancy  they  are  just 
agoing  to  recover  all,  and  make  a  fortune  equal  to  their  bound- 
less wishes.  If  they  could  but  see  themselves  as  the  unexcited 
bystanders  see  them,  they  would  throw  away  the  dice,  and  rush 
with  self-loathing  from  the  hell  in  which  they  find  only  their 
own  ruin. 

The  principle  on  which  Protestants  seek  even  worldly  felicity 
is  false,  and  we  can  say  nothing  better  of  them,  than  that  they 
prove  themselves  what  the  sacred  Scriptures  would  term  fools  in 
following  it.  When  was  it  ever  known  that  pride,  following  it- 
self, did  not  meet  mortification,  or  that  any  worldly  distinction, 
or  good,  sought  for  its  own  sake,  did  not  either  baffle  pursuit,  or 
prove  a  canker  to  the  heart?  Did  you  ever  see  a  man  running 
after  fame  that  ever  overtook  it,  or  a  man  always  nursing  his 
health  that  was  ever  other  than  sickly  ?  Have  you  no  eyes, 
no  ears,  no  understanding  ?  Fame  comes,  if  at  all,  unsought, 
greatness  follows  in  the  train  of  humilit}^,  and  happiness,  coy  to 
the  importunate  wooer  throws  herself  into  the  arms  of  him 
who  treats  her  with  indifference.  All  experience  proves  the  truth 
of  the  principle,  "  Seek  first  the  kingdom  of  God,  and  his  jus- 
tice, and  all  these  things  shall  be  superadded  unto  you."  Take 
it  as  inspiration,  as  the  word  of  God,  or  as  a  maxim  of  human 
prudence,  it  is  equally  true,  and  he  who  runs  against  it  only 
proves  his  own  folly.  "  Live  while  you  live,"  says  the  Protest- 
ant Epicurean.  Be  it  so  ;  live  while  you  live,  but  live  you  can- 
not, unless  you  live  to  God,  according  to  the  principles  of  the 


262  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

Catholic  religion.  Live  now  you  do  not,  and  you  know  you  do 
not ;  you  are  only  just  agoinr/,  and  not  a  few  of  you  fear  that 
you  are  never  even  agoing  to  live,  as  all  your  poetry,  with  its 
deep  pathos  and  melodious  wail,  too  amply  proves. 

Here  comes  in  to  our  aid  the  excellent  work  before  us.  It  ex- 
actly meets  the  present  state  of  the  Protestant  world,  and  makes 
the  only  kind  of  appeal  to  which,  in  their  present  mood,  they 
■will  listen.  Its  author  makes  no  apology  for  Catholicity,  he 
offers  no  direct  argument  for  its  truth  ;  he  simply  comes  forward 
and  compares  the  respective  influences  of  Protestantism  and 
Catholicity  on  European  civilization,  and  shows,  that,  while 
Catholicity  tends  unceasingly  to  advance  civilization,  Protestant- 
ism as  unceasingly  tends  to  savagism,  and  that  it  is  to  its  hostile 
influences  we  owe  the  slow  progress  of  European  civilization 
during  the  last  three  centuries.  He  shows  that  Protestantism  is 
hostile  to  liberty,  to  philosophy,  to  the  higher  mental  culture,  to 
art,  to  equality,  to  political  and  social  well-being.  He  shows  it, 
we  say  ;  not  merely  asserts,  but  proves  it,  by  unanswerable  argu- 
ments and  undeniable  facts.  If  any  one  doubts  our  judgment,  we 
refer  him  to  the  work  itself,  and  beg  him  to  gainsay  its  facts, 
or  answer  its  reasoning,  if  he  can.  The  Protestant  who  reads 
it  will  hardly  boast  of  his  Protestantism  again. 


AUTHORITY   AND   LIBERTY. 

APRIL,    1849. 

A  CRITIC  in  this  city  expresses  surprise  that  this  book  could 
have  been  written  by  a  young  man  born  and  brought  up  in 
Kentucky ;  but  we  see  no  reason  why  it  could  not  have  been 
written  by  a  young  man  as  w^ell  as  by  an  old  man,  and  in  Ken- 
tucky as  well  as  in  any  other  part  of  the  Union.     We  suppose 

*  Remarks  on  the  Past,  and  its  Legacies  to  American  Society.  By 
J.  D.  NouRSE.  Louisville  (Ky.) :  Morton  &  Griswold  1S47.  IGino. 
pp.  223. 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  263 

they  read  and  think  in  Kentucky  as  well  as  in  Massachusetts ; 
and  it  is  not  more  strange  that  a  young  Kentuckian  than  that  a 
Bostonian  should  expend  a  good  deal  of  thought  in  elahorating 
a  system  compounded  of  truth  and  falsehood,  conmion-place  and 
crude  speculation.  The  book  certainly  indicates  some  natural 
and  acquired  abihty,  but  no  ability  peculiar  to  either  side  of  the 
Alleghanies.  The  substance  of  it  may  be  read  any  day  in 
Schlegel,  Carlyle,  Macaulay,  Guizot,  Bancroft,  and  The  Boston 
Quarterly  Revieiu.  We  have  discovered  nothing  new  or  striking 
in  the  views  it  sets  forth,  or  if  now  and  then  something;  we  never 
met  with  before,  it  is  usually  something  we  have  no  desire  to 
meet  with  again. 

The  author  tells  us,  in  his  brief  advertisement^  "  that  it  may 

seem  presumptuous  for  a  young  backwoodsman to  enter 

the  lists  with  Schlegel,  Guizot,  and  Macaulay."  We  think  it  not 
only  may  seer^i  so,  but  that  it  actually  is  so ;  for  Schlegel  and 
Guizot — to  say  nothing  of  Macaulay — are  at  least  men  of  varied 
and  profound  erudition.  They  are  scholars,  and  have  not  de- 
rived their  learning  at  second  or  third  hand.  Mr.  Nourse  may 
rival,  nay,  surpass  them,  in  his  ambition  and  self-confidence  ;  but 
he  must  live  long,  and  enjoy  advantages  of  study  which  neither 
Kentucky  nor  Massachusetts  affords,  before  he  rivals  them  in 
any  thing  else,  or  can  do  much  else  than  travesty  them.  Not 
that  we  ragard  either  of  them  as  a  safe  guide.  Guizot  is  eclec- 
tic and  humanitarian ;  and  Schlegel  is  too  mystical,  and  too 
ambitious,  to  reduce  within  a  theory  matters  which  by  their  very 
nature  transcend  any  theory  the  human  mind  can  form  or  com- 
prehend. Mr.  Nourse  has,  if  you  will,  extraordinary  natural 
abilities,  an  honest  and  ingenuous  disposition  ;  but  he  has  not  yet 
begun  to  master  the  present,  far  less  the  whole  past.  He  has  a 
vao'ue  recoofnition  of  relio^ion,  concedes  some  influence  to  Chris- 
tianity  in  civilizing  the  world ;  but  he  is  without  faith,  and  has 
yet  to  learn  the  very  rudiments  of  the  Christian  creed.  We 
doubt,  also,  whether  he  is  able  to  give  even  the  outlines  of  a 
single  historical  period,  or  of  a  single  people  or  institution,  with 
sufficient  accuracy  to  enable  them  to  serve  as  the  basis  of  a  sin 


264  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

gle  sound  induction.  One  should  know  the  facts  of  history  be- 
fore proceeding  to  construct  its  2>hUosophy.  He  will  forgive  us, 
therefore,  if  we  tell  him  that  we  do  regard  him  as  not  a  little 
presumptuous  in  attempting  a  work  for  which  he  has  in  reahty 
not  a  single  qualification.  He  writes,  indeed,  with  earnestness  ; 
his  style,  though  somewhat  cramped,  and  deficient  in  freedom 
and  ease,  is  dignified,  simple,  clear,  and  terse,  occasionally  rich 
and  beautiful ;  but  this  cannot  atone  for  the  general  incorrectness 
of  his  statements,  or  the  crudeness  and  unsoundness  of  his 
speculations. 

With  sound  premises  and  freed  from  the  prejudices  of  his 
education,  we  doubt  not,  Mr.  Nourse  might  arrive  at  passable 
conclusions ;  but  he  is  ruined  by  his  love  of  theorizing,  his  false 
philosophy,  and  his  unsound  theolog3^  He  may  have  philan- 
thropic impulses  and  generous  sentiments  ;  he  may  mean  to  be 
a  Christian,  and  actually  believe  that  he  is  a  Christian  believer; 
but,  whether  he  knows  it  or  not,  the  order  of  thought  which  he 
seeks  to  develop  and  propagate  is  neither  more  nor  less  than  the 
old  Alexandrian  Syncretism,  as  obtained  through  German  Mys- 
ticism, French  Eclecticism,  and  Boston  Transcendentalism.  Rad- 
ically considered,  his  system,  if  system  it  can  be  called,  is  the 
old  Alexandrian  system,  which  spi-ang  up  in  the  third  century 
of  our  era,  as  the  rival  of  the  Christian  Church,  ascended  the 
throne  of  the  Cccsars  with  Julian  the  Apostate,  and  fled  to  Per- 
sia in  the  sixth  century,  when  Justinian  closed  the  last  schools 
of  philosophy  at  Athens.  This  system  was  an  attempted  fusion 
of  all  the  particular  forms  of  Gentilism,  moulded  into  a  sha})e  as 
nearly  like  Christianity  as  it  might  be,  and  intended  to  dispute 
with  it  the  empire  of  the  world.  It  borrowed  largely  from 
Christianity, — copied  the  forms  of  its  hierarchy,  and  many  of 
its  dogmas  ;  which  has  led  some  in  more  recent  times,  who  np.ver 
consult  chronology,  to  charge  the  Church  with  having  herself 
copied  her  hierarchy,  her  ritual,  and  her  principle  doctiines  from 
it.  It  made  no  direct  war  on  the  Christian  Symbol ;  it  simply 
denied  or  derided  the  sources  whence  it  was  obtained,  and  the 
authority  which  Christian  faith  always  presupposes.     It  called 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  265 

itself  Philosophy,  and  its  pretension  was  to  raise  philosophy  to 
tue  dignity  of  religion,  and  to  do  by  it  what  Christianity  pro- 
fesses to  do  by  faith  and  an  external  and  supernaturally  accred- 
ited revelation.  It  was,  therefore.  Gentile  Rationalism,  and,  in 
fact,  Gentile  Rationalism  carried  to  its  last  degree  of  perfection. 
It  is  this  Rationalism,  met  and  refuted  by  the  great  Fathers  of 
the  third,  fourth,  and  fifth  centuries,  that  hes  at  the  bottom  of 
our  author's  thought,  and  which  he  labors  to  reproduce  with  a 
zeal — we  cannot  say  abihty — not  unworthy  of  a  disciple  of 
Plotinns,  Proclus,  and  Porphyrins. 

This  should  not  surprise  us.  There  is  nothing  new  under  the 
sun.  The  old  Gentile  world  exhausted  human  reason  ;  and  it 
is  not  possible,  even  with  a  full  knowledge  of  all  the  Church 
teaches,  taking  human  reason  alone  as  the  basis  of  our  system, 
to  surpass  the  old  Alexandrian  Syncretism,  or  Neoplatonism,  as 
it  is  sometimes  called.  In  constructing  it,  the  human  mind  had 
present  to  it,  as  materials,  all  the  labors  and  traditions  of  Gentil- 
isra  in  all  ages  and  nations,  and  also  all  the  teachings  and  tra- 
ditions of  Jews  and  Christians,  as  well  as  of  the  Jewish  and 
early  Christian  sects  ;  and  it  was,  from  the  point  of  view  of  Ra- 
tionalism, the  resume  of  the  whole.  It  was  the  last  word  of 
heathendom.  In  it  Gentihsm,  collecting  and  combining  all  that 
was  not  the  Christian  Church,  exerted  ail  her  forces  and  all  her 
energies  for  a  last  desperate  battle  against  the  Nazarene,  against 
the  triumph  of  the  Cross.  Catholicity  or  Rationalism  is,  as 
every  one  knows  or  may  know,  the  only  alternative  that  remains 
to  us  since  the  preaching  of  the  Gospel.  Impossible,  then,  is  it 
to  depart  from  Catholicity  without  falling  back  on  Rationalism, 
and,  if  a  little  profound  and  consistent,  upon  Neoplatonism,  as 
Rationalism  in  its  fulness  and  integrity.  All  heresies  are  simply 
attempts  to  return  to  this  Rationalism,  and  in  it  they  find  their 
complement,  as  may  be  historically  as  well  as  logically  establish- 
ed. All  your  modern  philosophies  are  regarded  as  profound 
and  complete  only  as  they  approach  it.  Kant,  Schelling,  Hegel, 
Cousin,  Leroux,  De  Lamennais,  Hermes,  Schleiermacher,  Car- 
lyle,  Emei-son,  Parker,  all  belong  to  the  Alexandrian  school,  and 


266  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

only  reproduce,  more  or  less  successfully,  its  teachings,  and  to 
the  best  of  their  ability  renew  the  war  it  waged  against  the 
Christian  Church. 

It  is  no  objection  to  what  we  assert,  that  the  sects  and  many 
of  the  modern  philosophies  retain  some  or  even  the  greater  part 
of  the  Christian  dogmas.     Neoplatonism  did  as  much.     We 
must  not  forget  that  Neoplatonisra  is  subsequent  to  the  Christian 
Church  ;  that  it  took  its  rise  in  the  school  of  Ammonius  Saccas, 
in  the  beginning  of  the  third  century  of  our  era  ;  that  it  received 
its  form  and  development  from  Plotinus,  Avho  flourished  about 
the  year  of  our  Lord  260  ;  and  that  it  proposed  itself  as  the 
rival  rather  than  the  antagonist  of  Christianity.     Its  aim  was  to 
satisfy  the  ever-recurring  and  indestructible  religious  wants  of 
the  human  soul,  without  recognizing  the  Christian   Church,  or 
bowing  to  the  authority  of  the  Nazarene.     It  was  not  the  Chris- 
tian doctrines,  abstracted  from  the  Christian  Church,  and  re- 
ceived as  philosopy  on  the  authority  of  reason  or  even  private 
inspirations,  instead  of  the  authority  of  our  Lord  and  his  super- 
naturally  commissioned  teachers,  that  it  opposed.     It  was  will- 
ing to  accept  Christianity  as  a  philosophy,  or  a  part  of  philoso- 
phy ;  but  not  as  a  religion,  far  less  as  a  religion  complete  in  it- 
self and  excluding  all  others.     Hence,  it,  as  well  as  the  Church, 
taught  one  Supreme  God  existing  as  a  Trinity  in  Unity,  the 
immortality  of  the  soul,  the  fall  of  man  and  the  corruption  of 
human  nature,  the  necessity  of  redemption,  self  denial  and  the 
practice  of  austere  virtue  ;  that  we  are  bound  to  worship  God, 
must  hve  for  him,  and  can  attain  to  supreme  felicity  only  in  at- 
taining to  an  ineffable  union  with  him.     In  the  simple  province 
of  philosophy  it  was  often  profound  and  just.     In  many  things 
it  and  Christianity  ran  parallel  one  with  the  other.     Not  unfre- 
quently  do  the   Alexandrian  philosophers  talk    hke    Christian 
Fathers,  and  Christian  Fathers  talk  like  Alexandrian  philoso- 
phers.    There  is  Neoplatonisra  in  St.  Gregory  Nazianzen,  in  St. 
Basil,  and  St.  Augustine.     The  most  renowned  of  the  Fathers 
studied  in  its  schools,  as  distinguished  Doctors  now  study  in  the 
schools  of  the  philosophers  of  France  and  Germany.     But  Neo- 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  267 

platoTiism  was  at  bottom  a  philosophy,  and  whatever  it  held 
from  Cliristianity,  it  held  as  philosophy,  as  resting  on  a  human, 
not  a  Divine  basis.  The  philosophers  transformed  Christianity, 
so  far  as  they  accepted  it,  into  a  philosophy  ;  while  the  Fathers 
made  Neoplatonism,  so  far  as  they  did  not  reject  it,  subservient 
to  Christianity,  to  the  statement  and  explication  of  Christian 
theology  to  the  human  understanding,  keeping  it  always  within 
the  province  of  reason,  and  never  allowing  it  to  become  the  ar- 
biter of  the  dogmas  of  faith,  or  to  supersede  or  interfere  with  the 
Divine  authority  on  which  alone  they  were  to  be  meekly  and 
submissively  received.  The  Fathers,  therefore,  were  not  less 
Christian  for  the  philosophy  they  did  not  reject,  nor  the  Alex- 
andrians the  less  Gentile  Rationalists  for  the  Christian  doctrines 
they  borrowed.  One  may  embrace,  avowedly,  all  Christian 
doctrine,  without  approaching  the  Christian  order,  if,  as  Hermes 
proposed,  he  embraces  it  as  philosophy,  or  on  the  authority  of 
reason  ;  for  the  Christian,  to  be  a  Christian  believer,  must  be- 
lieve God,  and  therefore  Christianity,  because  it  is  his  supernat- 
ural word,  not  because  it  is  the  word  of  human  reason  or  human 
sentiment,  as  contend  our  modern  Liberal  Christians. 

It,  would  be  interesting  to  show  historically  the  resemblance 
of  the  whole  modern  un-Catholic  world  to  the  old  Alexandrian 
world  represented  by  Plotinus.  Jamblicus,  Porphyrins,  Proclus, 
and  Julian  the  Apostate  ; — how  each  heresiarch  and  each  mod- 
ern philosopher  only  reproduces  what  the  old  Christian  Fathers 
fought  against  and  defeated,— how  every  progress  in  this  boasted 
age  of  progress  only  tends  to  bring  us  back  to  the  system  which 
the  Gregories,  the  Basils,  and  their  associates  combated  from 
the  Christian  pulpit  and  the  Episcopal  chair;  but  we  have 
neither  the  space  nor  the  learning  to  do  it  as  it  should  be  done. 
Yet  no  one  who  has  studied  with  tolerable  care  the  learned 
Gentilism  of  the  third,  fourth,  and  fifth  centuries  of  our  era,  and 
is  passably  well  acquainted  with  the  modern  Rationalism  of 
France  and  Germany,  and  the  movements  of  the  various  heret- 
ical sects  in  our  day,  can  doubt  that  our  own  nineteenth  century 
is  distinguished  for  its  return  to  Gentilism,  and  has  nearly  repro- 


268  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

duced  it  under  its  most  perfect  form.  The  separate  forms  of  heath- 
enism had  become  effete  ;  no  one  of  them  any  longer  satisfied 
the  minds  or  the  hearts  of  its  adherents.  An  age  of  skepticism 
and  indifterence  had  intervened,  attended  by  a  Hcentiousness  of 
manners  and  pubHc  and  private  corruption  which  threatened  the 
universal  dissolution  of  society.  Individuals  rose  who  saw  it, 
and  felt  the  necessity  of  a  general  reform,  and  that  a  general 
reform  was  impossible  without  religion.  But  they  would  not, 
on  the  one  hand,  accept  the  Church,  and  could  not,  on  the  other, 
hope  any  thing  from  any  of  the  old  forms  of  heathenism.  The 
world  must  have  a  religion,  and  could  not  get  on  without  it. 
But  how  get  a  religion,  when  all  religions  were  discarded,  when 
all  forms  of  religion  were  treated  with  general  neglect  or  con- 
tempt ? 

The  Reformers  saw  that  they  must  have  a  religion,  and,  since, 
none  existed  which  was  satisfactory,  none  which  was  powerful 
enough  to  meet  the  exigency  of  the  times,  they  must  make  one 
for  themselves ; — that  is,  form  one  to  their  purpose  out  of  the 
old  particular  religions  no  longer  heeded.  Alexandria  was  their 
proper  workshop,  for  there  were  collected  or  lying  about  in  glo- 
rious confusion  all  the  necessary  materials.  They  began  with 
the  assumption,  that  all  religions  are  at  a  bottom  equally  true, 
and  that  the  error  of  each  is  in  its  exclusivcness,  in  its  claiming 
to  be  the  whole  of  religion,  and  the  only  true  religion.  Take, 
then,  the  elements  of  each,  mould  them  together  into  a  com- 
plete and  harmonious  whole,  and  you  will  have  the  true  religion, 
a  religion  which  will  meet  the  wants  of  all  minds  and  hearts, 
rally  the  human  race  around  it,  and  be  "  The  Church  of  the 
Future."  Hence  arose  the  Alexandrian  Syncretism,  combining 
in  one  systematic  whole,  as  far  as  reason  could  combine  them,  all 
the  known  religions  of  the  world,  which,  under  the  name  of 
philosophy,  but  which  became  a  veritable  superstition,  disputed 
the  empire  of  the  world  with  Christianity  for  full  three  hundred 
years. 

What  is  the  movement  of  our  day,  but  an  attempt  of  the 
same  sort  ?     By  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  269 

various  forms  of  heresy,  in  which  the  Protestant  spirit  had  de- 
veloped itself,  and  which  had  attempted  to  reproduce  Gentilism 
without  forfeiting  their  title  to  Christianity,  had  exhausted  their 
moral  force,  and  the  age  began  to  lapse  again  into  the  old  license 
and  corruption.  Never  in  its  worst  days  was  there  grosser  im- 
morality and  corruption  in  the  Roman  Empire  than  prevailed  in 
England  during  the  earher  half  of  the  last  century,  under  the 
reigns  of  George  the  Fii-st  and  George  the  Second.  Deism  was 
rife  in  the  court,  in  the  schools,  in  the  Church,  among  the  nobil- 
ity and  the  people.  Germany  was  hardly  better,  if  so  good  ;  and 
of  France  under  the  regency  of  the  profligate  Duke  of  Orleans, 
or  under  Louis  the  Fifteenth  with  his  pare  an  cerfs,  we  need  not 
speak.  Literature  was  infidel  throughout,  and  atheism  became 
feshionable.  To  the  rabid  infidel  propagandism,  begun  by  the 
English  deists,  and  carried  on  by  Voltaire  and  his  associates, 
under  the  motto  Ecrasez  Vinfaine,  soon  succeeded,  as  of  old, 
profound  skepticism  and  indifference.  Neither  false  religion  nor 
no  religion  could  rouse  the  mind  from  the  torpidity  into  which 
it  sank.  Exclusive  heresy,  or,  as  we  may  say,  sectarianism,  born 
from  the  Protestant  Reformation,  though  producing  its  effects 
far  beyond  the  limits  of  the  so-called  Protestant  world,  had 
caused  all  forms  of  religion,  about  the  beginning  of  this  century, 
to  be  treated  as  equally  false  and  contemptible. 

But,  once  more,  individuals  started  up  frightened  at  the  pros- 
pect they  beheld.  They  felt  and  owned  the  eternal  truth,  Man 
cannot  he  an  atheist.  They  saw  the  necessity  of  a  general  re- 
form, and  that  a  general  reform  could  be  effected  only  by  relig- 
ion. But,  disdaining  the  Church  as  did  the  old  ^Alexandrians, 
and  seeing  clearly  that  all  the  particular  forms  of  Protestantism 
were  worn  out,  they  felt  that  they  must  have  a  new  religion,  and 
to  have  it  they  must  either  make  it  for  themselves,  or  reconstruct 
it  out  of  such  materials  as  the  old  religions  supplied.  The  prin- 
ciple on  which  they  proceed  is  precisely  the  Alexandrian.  To 
them  all  religions  are  equally  true  or  equally  false, — true  as 
parts  of  a  whole,  false  when  regarded  each  as  a  whole  in  itself 
Take,  then,  the  several  religions  which  have  been  and  are,  mould 


270  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

them  into  a  complete,  uniform,  and  systematic  whole,  and  you 
will  have  what  the  Editor  of  The  Boston  Quarterly  Review, 
and  Chevalier  Bunsen  after  him,  call  "  The  Church  of  the  Fu- 
ture," and  Dr.  Bushnell  and  \ns>  friends  call  "Comprehensive 
Christianity," — what  Saint-Simon  denominated  Nouveau  Chris- 
tianisme,  and  M.  Victor  Cousin  brilliantly  advocates  under  the 
name  of  Eclecticism,  borrowed  avowedly  from  the  Neoplatonists. 
In  perfect  harmony  with  this,  you  see  everywhere  attempts 
to  amalgamate  sects,  to  form  the  un-Catholic  wor^  into  one 
body,  with  a  common  creed,  a  common  worship,  and  a  common 
purpose.  While  the  philosophers  elaborate  the  bases  of  the 
union,  statesmen  and  ministers  attempt  its  practical  realization. 
This  is  what  we  see  in  "Evangelical  Alliances"  and  "World's 
Conventions,"  in  the  formation  of  "The  Evangelical  Church" 
in  Prussia,  and  the  union  of  Prussia  and  England  in  establishing 
the  bishopric  of  Jerusalem.  The  aim  is  everywhere  the  same 
that  it  was  with  the  Alexandrians,  the  principles  of  proceeding 
are  the  same,  and  the  result,  if  obtained,  must  be  similar.  The 
movement  of  the  un-Catholic  world  now,  how  much  soever  it 
may  borrow  from  Christianity,  however  near  it  may  approach 
the  Catholic  model,  can  be  regarded,  by  those  who  understand 
it,  only  as  a  conscious  or  unconscious  effort  to  reproduce  the 
Gentile  Rationalism  of  the  old  Alexandrian  school. 

The  identity  of  the  two  movements  might  be  established  even 
down  to  minute  details.  The  most  fanciful  dreams  of  our  Tran- 
scendentalists  may  be  found  among  the  Alexandrians, — either 
with  those  who  disavowed  Christianity,  or  the  sects,  professing 
to  retain  it,  allied  to  them.  The  very  principle  of  Transcenden- 
talism, namely,  an  element  or  activity  in  the  human  soul  above 
reason,  by  which  man  is  placed  in  immediate  communion  with 
the  Divine  mind,  is  nothing  but  the  Ecstasy  or  Trance  of  the 
Neoplatonists,  or  their  ffth  source  of  science ;  and  the  Alexan- 
drian theurgy  and  magic  are  reproduced  in  your  Swedenborg- 
ianism  and  Mesmerism.  ^loreover,  the  Protestant  Reformation 
itself  not  only  involved  as  its  legitimate  consequence  a  return  to 
the  Alexandrian  Rationalism,  but  was  in  some  measure  the  ef- 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  2Yl 

feet  of  such  return.  To  be  satisfied  of  this,  we  need  but  study 
the  history  of  the  Revival  of  Letters  and  the  controversies  of 
the  schools  in  the  fifteenth  century.  We  say  nothing  of  the 
Revival  in  so  far  as  it  was  simply  a  revival  of  classical  antiquity 
under  the  relation  of  art,  or  beauty  of  form,— under  which  rela- 
tion it  was  not  censui-able,  but  relatively,  perhaps  a  progress. 
Christian  piety  and  learning  can  coexist  with  barbarism  in  taste, 
and  want  of  elegance  and  polish  in  manners,  but  do  not  demand 
them.  The  Revival,  however,  was,  in  fact,  something  more  than 
this,  and  something  far  different  from  it.  Those  Greek  scholai-s 
who  escaped  from  Constantinople  when  jt  was  taken  by  the 
Turks,  and  who  spread  themselves  over  Western  Europe,  did  not 
bring  with  them  merely  the  poets,  orators,  and  historians  of  an- 
cient Greece,  nor  merely  more  complete  editions  of  Plato  and 
Aristotle ;  they  brought  with  them  Proclus  and  Plotinus,  and 
the  old  x\lexandrian  Rationalism,  with  its  Oriental  comprehen- 
siveness and  its  Greek  subtlety.  They  made  no  attacks  on  the 
Church, — they  professed  profound  respect  for  Catholicity,  and 
with  Eastern  suppleness  readily  submitted  to  hor  authority ;  but 
they  deposited  in  the  minds  and  hearts  of  their  disciples  the 
germs  of  a  system  the  rival  of  hers,  which  weakened  their  at- 
tachment to  her  doctrines,  disgusted  them  with  the  barbarous 
Latin  and  un- Greek  taste  of  her  Monks,  and  the  rigid,  some- 
times fi-igid,  Scholasticism  of  her  Doctors.  These  germs  were 
not  slow  in  developing,  and  very  soon  gave  us  the  Neoplatonists 
in  philosophy,'  and  the  Humanists  in  literature,  of  the  fifteenth 
and  sixteenth  centuries.  The  former  destroyed  the  authority  of 
the  Schoolmen  ;  the  latter,  at  the  head  of  whom  stood  Erasmus, 
the  Voltaire  of  his  time,  covered  the  clergy,  especially  the  Monks, 
with  ridicule,  and  sowed  the  seeds  of  practical,  as  the  others  had 
of  speculative  infideHty.  Combined  or  operating  to  the  same 
end,  they  prepared,  and,  favored  by  the  politics  of  the  period, 
produced  the  Protestant  Reformation.  Not  accidentally,  then, 
has  Protestantism  from  its  birth  manifested  a  Gentile  spirit,  mis- 
represented and  ndiculed  every  thing  distinctively  Christian,  or 
that  it  is  now  undeniably  developing  in  pure  Alexandrian  Syn- 


2'72  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

cretism,  gathering  itself  up  as  a  grand  and  well-organized  super- 
stition to  wage  war  once  more  on  the  old  Alexandrian  battle- 
ground, with  the  old  Alexandrian  forces  and  arms,  against  the 
Nazarene,  as  Julian  the  Apostate  always  tenns  our  Lord.  Was 
it  by  accident  that  Protestantism,  wherever  permitted  to  follow 
its  instincts,  began  by  puUing  down,  breaking,  or  defacing  the 
Cross,  the  sacred  symbol  of  Christianity  ? 

The  identity  of  the  modern  movement  with  that  which  result- 
ed in  Alexandrian  Syncretism  may  be  traced  also  in  the  panthe- 
istic tendencies  of  the  day.  The  Alexandrian  school  rejected 
none  of  ihe  populai^  gods  ;  it  placed  Apis  and  Jove,  Isis  and 
Hercules,  and  sometimes  even  Christ  himself,  in  the  same  tem- 
ple ;  but  all  under  the  shadow  of  the  god  Serapis,  the  symbol 
of  unity,  or  rather  of  the  whole,  the  all,  that  is,  of  pure  pan- 
theism, in  which  all  pure  Rationalism  is  sure  to  end.  To  what 
does  all  modern  philosophy  tend,  but  to  pantheism  ?  Have  we 
not  seen  Spinoza  in  our  own  day  rehabilitated,  and  commented 
upon  as  the  greatest  of  modern  philosophers  ?  Cousin's  Eclecti- 
cism is  undeniably  pantheistic,  and  less  cannot  be  said  of  Schel- 
lingism  or  Hegelism.  Socialism,  now  so  rife,  is  simply  pantheism 
adapted  to  the  ai)prehensions  of  the  vulgar, — refined  and  volup- 
tuous with  the  Fourierists  and  Saint-Simonians,  coarse  and  re- 
volting with  the  Chartists  and  Red  Republicans. 

But  we  are  pursuing  this  line  of  remark  beyond  our  original 
purpose.  We  may  return  to  it  hereafter.  In  the  meantime  we 
invite  those  who  have  the  requisite  leisure  and  learning  to  take 
up  the  subject,  and  consider  the  relation  of  all  the  ancient  and 
modern  sects  to  Gcntilism,  the  persistence  of  Gentilism  in  Chris- 
tian nations  down  to  our  own  times,  in  spite  of  the  anathemas 
of  the  Church  and  the  unwearied  efforts  of  the  Catholic  clergy 
to  exterminate  it,  and  its  all  but  avowed  revival  in  our  own  day 
under  the  most  comprehensive,  scientific,  erudite,  subtle,  and 
dangerous  form  it  has  ever  assumed.  In  doing  this,  great  atten 
tion  should  be  paid  to  chronology  ;  for  the  Gentilism  with  which 
it  is  the  fashion  among  Protestants  and  unbelievers  to  compare 
Christianity,  and  from   which  it  is  pretended  the  Church   has 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  273 

large./  borrowed,  will  be  tbuiid  to  have  "been  formed  two  cen- 
turies and  a  half  after  the  birth  of  our  Lord.  That  stupend- 
ous fabric,  that  systematic  organization  of  Gentilism,  which  we 
find  in  the  time  of  Julian  the  Apostate,  and  which  fell  with  him, 
was  not  the  model  copied  by  the  Church,  but  was  itself  mod- 
elled after  the  Christian  hierarchy,  and  it  is  heathenism  that  has 
Christianized,  not  the  Church  that  has  heathenized.  The  Pla- 
tonism  of  modern  times,  whether  on  the  Continent  or  in  Eng- 
land, is  not  the  Platonism  of  Plato,  but  of  the  Alexandrians,  a«; 
every  one  knows  who  has  studied  Plato  himself  in  his  own 
inimitable  Dialogues,  not  merely  in  the  speculations  of  Plotinus, 
or  the  commentaries  of  Proclus. 

That  our  author,  born  and  brought  up  in  the  Protestant 
world,  and  formed  by  its  Gentile  spii'it  and  tendencies,  should 
even  unconciously  fall  into  the  Alexandrian  order  of  thought, 
and  labor  to  reconstruct  a  system  intended  to  rival  the  Christian, 
is  nothing  strange.     In  doing  so,  he  only  yields  to  the  spirit  of 
the  age,  and  follows  the  lead  of  those  whom  the  age  owns  and 
reverences   as    its    chiefs.     That   his    system    is   not  Christian, 
although  he  would  have  us  receive  it  as  Christian,  is  evident 
enouo-h  fi'om  his  dictum  with  regard  to  miracles.     "  The  mira- 
cles ascribed  to  Christ  and  his  Apostles,"  he  says  (p.  61,)  "how- 
ever conclusive  to  those  who  witnessed  them,  are  no  evidence 
to  us,  until  hj  other  means  we  have  established  the  truth  of  the 
writings  which  record  them, — that  is  to  say,  until  we  havejyroved 
all  that  ive  ivish  to  j^rove:'     There  is  a  sophism  in  this,  which, 
probably,  the  author  does  not  perceive.     If  the  writings  are  the 
otili/  authority  for  the  miracles  as  historical  facts,  that  we  must 
establish  their  historical  authenticity  before  the  miracles  can  be 
evidence  to  us,  we  concede;  but  not  their  truth,  ihdi  is,  the 
truth  of  the  mysteries  they  teach,  the  material  object  of  faith, — 
therefore  the  matter  we  want  proved.     The  miracles  are  not 
proofs  of  the  mysteries,  but  simply  motives  of  credibility.    "  Ptab- 
bi,  we  know  that  thou  art  come  a  teacher  from  God ;  for  no  man 
could  do  these  miracles  which  thou  doest,  unless  God  were  with 


274  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

him."  Ordinary  historical  testimony,  though  wholly  inadequate 
to  prove  the  mysteries,  is  sufficient  to  prove  the  miracles  as  facts, 
and,  when  so  proved,  they  are  evidence  to  us  in  the  same  man- 
ner and  in  the  same  degree  that  they  were  to  those  who  witnessed 
them.  It  does  not,  therefore,  follow  that  we  must  prove,  without 
them,  all  we  want  proved,  before  they  can  be  evidence  to  us. 

But  this  by  the  way.  The  author  in  his  dictum  asserts  either 
that  Christianity  is  not  provable  at  all,  or  that  it  is  provable 
without  miracles ;  but  no  Christian  can  assert  either  the  one  or 
the  other.  The  former  is  absurd,  if  Christianity  came  from  God 
and  is  intended  for  reasonable  beings.  God,  as  the  author  of  rea- 
son, cannot  require  us  to  believe,  and  we  as  reasonable  beings 
cannot  believe,  without  reason,  or  authority  sufficient  to  satisfy 
reason.  The  latter  cannot  be  said  without  reducing  Christianity 
to  the  mere  order  of  nature ;  for  a  supernatural  religion  is,  in 
the  nature  of  things,  provable  only  by  supernaturally  accredited 
witnesses,  and  witnesses  cannot  be  supernaturally  accredited 
without  miracles  of  some  sort.  To  deny  the  necessity  of  mir- 
acles as  motives  of  credibility,  or  to  assert  the  provability  of 
Christianity  without  them,  is  to  deny  the  supernatural  character 
of  Christianity,  and  therefore  to  deny  Christianity  itself;  for 
Christianity  is  essentially  and  distinctively  supernatural.  With- 
out the  miracles,  Christianity  is  provable  only  as  a  philosophy, 
and  as  a  philosophy  it  must  lie  wholly  within  the  order  of  na- 
ture ;  since  philosophy,  by  its  very  definition,  is  the  science  of 
principles  cognizable  by  the  light  of  natural  reason.  Rational- 
ism turns  for  ever  within  the  limits  of  nature,  and,  do  its  best,  it 
can  never  overleap  them.  It  can  never  rise  to  Christianity  ;  all 
it  can  do  is,  by  rejecting  or  explaining  away  the  mysteries,  dis- 
carding all  that  transcends  reason,  to  bring  Christianity  down  to 
itself, — ^^a  fact  we  commend  to  the  serious  consideration  of  all 
who  pretend  that  our  religion,  even  to  its  loftiest  mysteries,  is 
rationally  or  philosophically  demonstrable.  The  Christianity 
they  can  prove  as  a  philosophy  is  no  more  the  Christianity  of 
the  Gospel  than  the  Neoplatonism  of  Proclus  and  Plotinus  was 
the  Christianity  of  the  Gregories,  the  Basils,  and  the  Augustines. 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  275 

The  author  also  betrays  the  unchristian  character  of  his  order 
of  thought  in  his  third  discourse,  entitled  Sjnritual  Despotism 
and  the  Reformation.  He  says,  indeed,  in  this  part  of  his  work, 
some  very  handsome  things — in  his  own  estimation — of  the 
Church ;  but,  as  he  says  them  from  the  humanitarian  point  of 
view,  on  the  hypothesis  that  she  is  a  purely  human  institution, 
and  therefore  a  gigantic  imposition  upon  mankind,  we  cannot 
take  them  as  evidences  of  his  Christian  mode  of  thinking.  If 
the  Church  is  what  we  hold  her  to  be,  these  humanitarian  com- 
pliments and  apologies  are  impertinent;  and  if  what  he  holds 
her  to  be,  they  betray  on  his  part  a  very  unchristian  laxity  of 
moral  principle.  An  infallible  Church,  the  Church  of  God, 
needs  no  apologies ;  man's  Church,  or  the  Synagogue  of  Satan, 
deserves  none.  But,  although  the  author  maintains  that  the 
Church  was  very  necessary  from  the  fifth  to  the  fifteenth  cen- 
tury,— that  she  preserved  our  holy  rehgion,  and  without  her 
Christian  faith  and  piety  would  have  been  lost,  Christianity 
would  have  been  unable  to  fulfil  her  mission,  and  the  European 
nations  would  have  remained  uncivilized,  ignorant,  illiterate, 
ruthless  barbarians, — he  yet  holds  that  she  was  a  spiritual  des- 
potism, and  the  Protestant  Reformation  was  inevitable  and  ne- 
cessary to  emancipate  the  human  mind  from  her  thraldom,  and 
to  prepare  the  way  for  mental  and  civil  freedom. 

According  to  the  author,  the  spiritual  despotism  of  the  Church 
consisted  in  her  claiming  and  exercising  authority  over  faith  and 
morals, — over  the  minds,  the  hearts,  and  the  consciences  of  the 
faithful.  If  we  catch  his  meaning,  which  does  not  appear  to  lie 
very  clear  or  distinct  even  in  his  own  mind,  the  despotism  is  in 
the  authority  itself,  not  simply  in  the  fact  that  the  Church  claims 
and  exercises  it.  It  would  be  equally  despotism,  if  claimed  and 
exercised  by  any  one  else,  because  it  is  intrinsically  hostile  to  the 
rights  of  the  mind  and  to  the  principles  of  civil  liberty.  Conse- 
quently, he  objects  not  merely  to  the  claimant,  but  to  the  thing 
claimed,  and  rejects  the  authority,  let  who  will  claim  it,  or  let  it 
be  vested  where  or  in  whom  it  may. 

But  this  is  obviously  unchristian.     If  we  suppose  Christianity 


276  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

at  all,  we  must  suppose  it  as  an  external  revelation  '  -t,.    a 

definite  and  authoritative  religion,  given  by  the  Si^pyeuie  L?  /f- 
giver  to  all  men  as  the  Supreme  Law,  binding  upon  the  whole 
man,  against  which  no  one  has  the  right  to  think,  speak,  or  act, 
and  to  which  every  one  is  bound  to  conform  in  thought,  word, 
and  deed.  All  this  is  implied  in  the  very  conception  of  Chris- 
tianity, and  must  be  admitted,  if  we  admit  the  Christian  religion 
at  all.  The  authority  objected  to  is  therefore  included  in  the 
fundamental  conception  of  the  Christian  revelation,  and  conse- 
quently we  cannot  denominate  it  a  spiritual  despotism  without 
denominating  Christianity  itself  a  spiritual  despotism,  which,  we 
need  not  say,  would  be  any  thing  but  Christian. 

The  author's  order  of  thought  would  carry  him  even  farther. 
If  the  authority  of  the  Church  is  a  spiritual  despotism  for  the 
reason  he  assigns,  the  authority  of  God  is  also  a  spiritual  des- 
potism. The  principle  on  which  he  objects  to  the  Church  is, 
that  the  mind  and  the  state  are  free,  and  that  any  authority 
over  either  is  unjust.  The  essence  of  despotism  is  not  that  it  is 
authority,  but  that  it  is  authority  without  right,  will  without 
reason,  power  without  justice.  We  cannot  suppose  the  exist- 
ence of  God  without  supposing  the  precise  authority  over  the 
mind  and  the  state  objected  to.  If  this  authority,  claimed  and 
exercised  in  his  name  by  the  Church,  is  despotism,  it  must  be,  then, 
because  he  hc^s  no  right  to  it ;  if  no  right  to  it,  he  is  not  sove- 
reign ;  if  not  sovereign,  he  does  not  exist.  If  God  does  not  exist, 
there  is  no  conscience,  no  law,  no  accountability,  moral  or  civil. 
To  this  conclusion  the  author's  notions  of  mental  freedom  and 
civil  liberty,  pushed  to  their  logical  consequences,  necessarily  lead. 

Every  Christian  is  obliged  to  recognize,  in  the  abstract,  to  say 
the  least,  the  precise  authority  claimed  and  exercised  by  the 
Church  over  faith  and  morals,  over  the  intellect  and  the  con- 
science, in  spirituals  and  in  temporals  ;  and  it  is  a  well-known 
fact,  that  all  Christian  sects,  as  long  as  they  retain  any  thing 
distinctively  Christian,  do  claim,  and,  as  far  as  able,  exercise  it, 
and  never  practically  abandon  it,  till  they  lapse  into  pure  Ra- 
tionalism, from  which  all  that  is  distinctively  Christian  disap- 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  277 

pears.  It  cannot  be  otherwise  ;  because  Christianity  is  essen- 
tially law,  and  the  Supreme  Law,  for  the  reason,  the  will,  the 
conscience,  for  individuals  and  nations,  for  the  subject  and  for 
the  prince.  If  our  author's  order  of  thought  were  Christian,  he 
could  not  object  to  authority  in  itself;  he  would  feel  himself 
obhged  to  assert  and  vindicate  it  somewhere  for  some  one ;  and 
and  if  he  objected  to  the  Church  at  all,  he  would  do  so,  not  be- 
cause of  the  authorit}^  but  because  it  is  not  rightfully  hers,  but 
another's, — which  would  be  a  legitimate  objection,  and  conclu- 
sive, if  sustained,  as  of  course  it  cannot  be,  by  the  facts  in  the 
case.  His  failure  to  object  on  this  ground  is  a  proof  that  his 
thouofht  is  not  Christian. 

The  author's  notions  of  authority  and  liberty  are  not  only  un- 
christian, but  exceedingly  unphilosophical  and  confused.  He 
has  no  just  conception  of  either,  and  is  evidently  unable  to  draw 
any  intelligible  distinction  between  authority  and  despotism  on 
the  one  hand,  or  between  liberty  and  license  on  the  other.  He 
can  conceive  of  authority  and  hberty  only  as  each  is  the  antago- 
nist or  the  limitation  of  the  other  ;  he  ingenuously  confesses  that 
he  is  unable  to  reconcile  them,  and  presents  their  reconciliation 
as  a  problem  that  Protestantism  has  yet  to  solve.  "  To  adjust 
the  respective  limits  of  these  antagonists, — Liberty  of  thought 
and  Ecclesiastical  authority, — and  bring  about  a  lasting  treaty 
of  peace  between  them,  is  the  yet  unsolved  problem  of  the  Re- 
formation. The  Reformers  attempted  to  solve  it,  and  strove  in 
vain  to  confine  the  torrent  they  had  set  in  motion,  within  cer- 
tain dikes  of  their  own  construction.  The  spring-tide  of  free  in- 
quiry, not  yet  perhaps  at  its  flood,  is  sweeping  away  their  bar- 
riers, and  ages  may  elapse  before  it  subsides  into  its  proper  chan- 
nel, after  cleansing  the  earth  of  a  thousand  follies  and  abuses." 
(p.  160.)  All  this  proves  that  his  order  of  thought  is  unchris- 
tian, and  that  his  conceptions  of  authority  and  of  liberty  are  not 
taken  from  the  Gospel.  No  intelligent  Christian,  no  sound 
philosopher  even,  ever  conceives  of  authority  and  liberty  as  an- 
tao-onists,  as  limiting  one  the  other,  or  admits  that  their  concili 
ation  is  an  unsolved  problem,  or  even  a  problem  at  all. 


278  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTr. 

The  Christian,  even  the  philosopher,  derives  all  from  God, 
and  nothing  from  man,  and  therefore  escapes  the  difEculty  felt 
by  our  author  and  the  Reformers.  He  knows  that  authority  is 
not  authority,  if  hmited,  and  liberty  is  not  libert}',  if  bounded. 
Consequently,  he  never  conceives  of  the  two  in  the  same  sphere, 
but  distributes  them  in  separate  spheres,  where  each  may  be 
supreme.  God  is  the  absolute,  underived,  and  unlimited  Sove- 
reign and  Proprietor  of  the  universe.  Here  is  the  foundation 
of  all  authority,  and  also  of  all  liberty.  Before  God  we  have  no 
liberty.  We  are  his,  and  not  our  own.  We  are  what  he  cre- 
ates us,  have  only  what  he  gives  us,  and  lie  completely  at  his 
mercy.  We  hold  all  from  him,  even  to  the  breath  in  our  nos- 
trils, and  he  has  the  sovereign  right  to  dispose  of  us  according 
to  his  own  will  and  pleasure.  In  his  presence,  and  in  presence 
of  his  law,  we  have  duties,  but  no  rights,  and  our  duty  and  his 
right  is  the  full,  entire,  and  unconditional  submission  of  ourselves, 
soul  and  body,  to  his  will.  Here  is  authority,  absolute,  full,  en- 
tire, and  unbounded, — as  must  be  all  authority,  in  order  to  be 
authority. 

In  the  presence  of  authority  there  is  no  liberty ;  where,  then, 
is  hberty  ?  It  is  not  before  God,  but  it  is  between  man  and 
man,  between  man  and  society,  and  between  society  and  society. 
The  absolute  and  plenary  sovereignty  of  God  excludes  all  other 
sovereignty,  and  our  absolute  and  unconditional  subjection  to 
him  excludes  all  other  subjection.  Hence  no  liberty  before  God, 
and  no  subjection  before  man  ;  and  therefore  liberty  is  rightly 
defined,  full  and  entire  freedom  from  all  authority  but  the  au- 
thority of  God.  Here  is  liberty,  liberty  in  the  human  sphere, 
and  liberty  full  and  entire,  without  restraint  or  limit  in  the 
sphere  to  which  it  pertains.  Man  is  subjected  to  God,  but  to 
God  only.  No  man,  in  his  own  right,  has  any,  the  least,  author- 
ity over  man  ;  no  body  or  community  of  men,  as  such,  has  any 
rightful  authority  either  in  spirituals  or  temporals.  All  merely 
human  authorities  are  usurpations,  and  their  acts  are  without 
obhgation,  null  and  void  from  the  beginning.  If  the  parent,  the 
pastor,  the  prince  has  any  right  to  command,  it  is  as  the  vicar 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  ^79 

of  God,  and  in  that  character  alone  ;  if  I  am  bound  to  obey  my 
parents,  my  pastor,  or  ray  prince,  it  is  because  my  Ood  com- 
mands me  to  obey  them,  and  because  in  obeying  them  I  am 
obeying  him.  Here  is  the  law  of  liberty,  and  here,  too,  is  the 
law  of  authority.  Understand  now  why  religion  must  found 
the  state,  why  it  is  nonsense  or  blasphemy  to  talk  of  an  alliance 
between  religion  and  liberty,  a  reconciliation  between  authority 
and  freedom.  Both  proceed  from  the  same  fountain,  the  abso- 
lute, underived,  unlimited  sovereignty  of  God,  and  can  be  no 
more  opposed  one  to  the  other  than  God  can  be  opposed  to  him- 
self Hence,  absolute  and  unconditional  subjection  to  God  is 
absolute  and  unhmited  freedom.  Therefore  says  our  Lord,  "  If 
the  Son  makes  you  free,  you  shall  be  free  indeed." 

The  sovereignty  of  God  does  not  oppose  liberty ;  it  founds 
and  guaranties  it.  Authority  is  not  the  antagonist  of  freedom ; 
it  is  its  support,  its  vindicator.  It  is  not  religion,  it  is  not  Chris- 
tianity, but  infidelity,  that  places  authority  and  liberty  one  over 
against  the  other,  in  battle  array.  It  is  not  God  who  crushes 
our  liberty,  robs  us  of  our  rights,  and  binds  heavy  burdens  upon 
our  shoulders,  too  grievous  to  be  borne ;  it  is  man,  who  at  the 
same  time  that  he  robs  us  of  our  rights  robs  God  of  his.  He 
who  attacks  our  freedom  attacks  his  sovereignty ;  he  who  vindi- 
cates his  sovereignty,  the  rights  of  God,  vindicates  the  rights  of 
man ;  for  all  human  rights  are  summed  up  in  the  one  right  to 
be  governed  by  God  and  by  him  alone,  in  the  duty  of  absolute 
subjection  to  him,  and  absolute  freedom  from  all  subjection  to 
any  other.  Maintain,  therefore,  the  rights  of  God,  the  suprem- 
acy in  all  departments  of  the  Divine  law,  and  you  need  not 
trouble  your  heads  about  the  rights  of  man,  freedom  of  thought 
or  civil  liberty ;  for  they  are  secured  with  all  the  guaranty  of 
the  Divine  sovereignty.  The  Divine  sovereignty  is,  therefore,  as 
indispensable  to  liberty  as  to  authority. 

We  need  not  stop  to  show  that  the  Divine  sovereignty  is  not 
itself  a  despotism.  The  essence  of  despotism,  as  we  have  said, 
is  not  that  it  is  authority,  but  that  it  is  authority  without  right, 
will  without  reason,  power  without  justice,  which  can  never  be 


280  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

said  of  God;  for  his  right  to  universal  dominion  is  unquestion- 
able, and  in  him  will  and  reason,  power  and  justice  are  never 
disjoined,  are  identical,  are  one  and  the  same,  and  are  indistin-  ' 
guishable  save  in  our  manner  of  conceiving  them.  His  sover- 
eignty is  rightful,  his  will  is  intrinsically,  eternally,  and  immuta- 
bly just  will,  his  power  just  power.  Absolute  subjection  to  him 
is  absolute  subjection  to  eternal,  immutable,  and  absolute  justice. 
Hence,  subjection  to  him  alone  is,  on  the  one  hand,  subjection  to 
absolute  justice,  and,  on  the  other,  freedom  to  be  and  to  do  all 
that  absolute  justice  permits.  Here  is  just  authority  as  great 
as  can  be  conceived,  and  true  liberty  as  large  as  is  possible  this 
side  of  license ;  and  between  the  two  there  is  and  can  be  in  the 
nature  of  things  no  clashing,  no  conflict,  no  antagonism.  How 
mean  and  shallow  is  infidel  philosophy ! 

Taking  this  view  along  with  us,  a  view  which  is  alike  that  of 
Christianity  and  of  sound  philosophy,  we  cannot  fail  to  perceive 
that  the  objection  urged  against  the  Church  is  exceedingly  ill- 
chosen.  The  Church,  if  what  she  professes  to  be, — and  we 
have  the  right  here  to  reason  on  the  supposition  that  she  is, — 
represents  the  Divine  sovereignty,  and  is  commissioned  by  God 
to  teach  and  to  govern  in  his  name.  Her  authority,  then,  is  his 
authority,  and  it  is  he  that  teaches  and  governs  in  her  and 
through  her ;  so  far,  then,  from  being  hostile  to  liberty  in  one 
department  or  another,  she  must  be  its  support  and  safeguard 
in  every  department.  The  ground  and  condition  of  liberty  is 
the  presence  of  the  Divine  sovereignty,  for  in  its  presence  there 
is  no  other  sovereignty,  no  other  authority,  consequently  no 
slavery.  The  objection,  that  the  Church  is  a  spiritual  despot- 
ism, is  grounded  on  the  supposition  that  all  authority  is  despot- 
ism and  all  Hbcrty  license, — that  is,  that  liberty  and  authority 
are  antagonist  forces, — which  would  require  us  to  deny  both, 
for  neither  despotism  nor  license  is  defensible.  Authority  and 
liberty  are  only  the  two  phases  of  one  and  the  same  principle ; 
suppose  the  absence  of  authority,  you  suppose  the  presence  of 
Hcense  or  despotism,  which,  again,  are  only  the  two  phases  of 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  281 

one  and  the  same  thing.  To  remove  hcense  or  despotism,  you 
must  suppose  the  presence  of  legitimate  authority.  The  Church 
being  the  representative  of  tlie  Divine  sovereignty  on  the  earth, 
introduces  legitimate  authority,  and  by  her  presence  necessarily 
displaces  both  despotism  and  license,  that  is,  establishes  both 
order  and  liberty. 

The  difficulty  which  Protestants  and  unbelievers  suppose  must 
exist  in  conforming  reason,  which  is  not  always  obedient  to  will, 
to  the  commands  of  authority,  arises  from  their  overlooking  the 
nature  of  authority.  The  authority  is  not  only  an  order  to  be- 
heve,  but  it  is  authoi-ity  for  believing.  The  authority  of  reason 
in  the  natural  order  is  derived  from  God,  not  from  man  ;  and 
the  obligation  to  believe  the  axioms  of  mathematics  or  the  def- 
initions of  geometry  aiises  solely  from  the  fact,  that  reason, 
which  declares  them,  does,  thus  far,  speak  by  Divine  authority. 
If  it  did  not,  reason  would  be  no  reason  for  believing  or  assert- 
ing them.  The  same  Divine  authority  in  a  higher  order,  speak- 
ing through  the  Church,  cannot  be  less  authoritative,  or  a  less 
authority  for  believing  what  the  Church  teaches.  Hence  the 
command  of  the  Church  is  at  once  authority  for  the  will  and 
for  the  reason,  an  injunction  to  believe  and  a  reason  for  behevinor. 
The  absolute  submission  of  reason  to  her  commands  is  not,  as 
some  fancy,  the  abnegation  of  reason.  Reason  does  not,  in  sub- 
mitting, fold  her  hands,  shut  her  eyes,  and  take  a  doze,  like  a 
fat  alderman  after  dinner,  but  keeps  wide  awake,  and  exercises 
her  highest  powers,  her  most  sacred  rights,  according  to  her 
own  nature.  What  more  reasonable  reason  for  believing  than 
the  command  of  God  ? — since,  in  the  order  of  truth,  his  sover- 
eignty is  identicall}'  his  veracity.  To  suppose  a  Catholic  mind  can 
have  any  difficulty  in  bringing  reason  to  assent  to  the  teachings 
of  the  Church,  believed  to  be  God's  Church,  is  as  absurd  as  to 
suppose  that  an  American  who  has  never  been  abroad  can  have 
any  difficulty  in  believing  that  there  is  such  a  city  as  Paris,  or 
that  Louis  Napoleon  Bonaparte  has  recently  been  elected  Pres- 
ident of  the  French  Republic ;  or  as  Id  suppose  that  the  logi- 
cian finds  a  difficulty  in  bringing  his  reason  to  assent  to  the 


282  AUTnoniTY  and  liberty. 

proposition  that  the  same  is  the  same,  that  the  same  thing  can- 
not both  be  and  not  be  at  the  same  time,  or  that  two  and  two 
make  four. 

It  is  not  the  Church  that  estabhshes  spiritual  despotism  ;  it  is 
she  who  saves  us  from  it.  Spiritual  despotism  is  that  which 
subjects  us,  in  spiritual  matters,  to  a  human  authority,  whether 
our  own  or  that  of  others, — for  our  own  is  as  human  as 
another's ;  and  the  only  redemption  from  it  is  in  having  in  them 
a  divine  authority.  Protestants  themselves  acknowledge  this, 
when  they  call  out  for  the  pure  word  of  God.  The  Cliurch 
teaches  by  Divine  authority  ;  in  submitting  to  her,  we  submit 
to  God,  and  are  freed  from  all  human  authority.  She  teaches 
infallibly ;  therefore,  in  believing  what  she  teaches,  we  believe 
the  truth,  which  frees  us  from  falsehood  and  error,  to  which  all 
men  without  an  infallible  guide  are  subject,  and  subjection  to 
which  is  the  elemental  principle  of  all  spiritual  despotism.  Her 
authority  admitted  excludes  all  other  authority,  and  therefore 
frees  us  from  heresiarchs  and  sects,  the  very  embodiment  of  s])ir- 
itual  despotism  in  its  most  odious  forms.  Sectarianism  is  spirit- 
ual despotism  itself;  and  to  know  how  far  spiritual  despotism 
and  spiritual  slavery  may  go,  you  have  only  to  study  the  his- 
tory of  the  various  sects  and  false  religions  which  now  exist,  or 
have  heretofore  existed. 

In  the  temporal  order,  again,  the  authority  claimed  and  exer- 
cised by  the  Church  is  nothing  but  the  assertion  over  the  state 
of  the  Divine  sovereignty,  which  she  represents,  or  the  subjection 
of  the  prince  to  the  Law  of  God,  in  his  character  of  prince  as 
well  as  in  his  character  of  man.  That  the  prince  or  civil  power 
is  subject  to  the  law  of  God,  no  man  who  admits  Christianity 
at  all  dares  question  ;  and,  if  the  Church  be  the  Divinely  com- 
missioned teacher  and  guardian  of  that  law,  as  she  certainly  is, 
the  same  subjection  to  her  must  be  conceded.  But  this,  instead 
of  being  opposed  to  civil  hberty,  is  its  only  possible  condition. 
Civil  libertv,  like  all  liberty,  is  in  being  held  to  no  obedience  but 
obedience  to  God ;  and  obedience  to  the  state  can  be  compatible 
with  liberty  only  on  the  condition  that  God  commands  it,  or  on 


AriHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  283 

the  condition  that  he  governs  in  the  state,  which  he  does  not 
and  cannot  do,  unless  the  state  holds  from  his  law  and  is  subject 
to  it.  To  deny,  then,  the  supremacy  of  the  Church  in  tempo- 
rals is  only  to  release  the  temporal  order  from  its  subjection  to 
the  Divine  sovereignty,  which,  so  far  as  regards  the  state,  is  to 
deny  its  authority,  or  its  right  to  govern,  and,  so  far  as  regards 
the  subject,  is  to  assert  pure,  unmitigated  civil  despotism.  All 
authority  divested  of  the  Divine  sanction  is  despotic,  because  it 
is  authority  without  right,  will  unregulated  by  reason,  power 
disjoined  from  justice.  Withdraw  the  supremacy  of  the  Church 
from  the  temporal  order,  and  you  deprive  the  state  of  that  sanc- 
tion, by  asserting  that  it  does  not  hold  from  God  and  is  not 
amenable  to  his  law ;  you  give  the  state  simply  a  human  basis, 
and  have  in  it  only  a  human  authority,  which  has  no  light  to 
govera,  which  I  am  not  bound  to  obey,  and  which  it  is  intolera- 
ble tyranny  to  compel  me  to  obey.  "Let  every  soul,"  says  the 
blessed  Apostle  Paul,  the  Doctor  of  the  Gentiles,  "  be  subject  to 
the  higher  powers ;  for  there  is  no  power  but  from  God ;  and 
those  that  are,  are  ordained  of  God.     Therefore  he  that  resisteth 

power   resisteth  the    ordinance  of  God Wherefore  be 

subject  of  necessity,  not  only  for  wrath,  but  for  conscience'  sake." 
(Rom.  xiii.  1-5.)  Here  the  obligation  of  obedience  is  grounded 
on  the  fact  that  the  civil  power  is  the  ordinance  of  God,  that  is, 
as  we  say,  holds  from  God.  But,  obviously,  this,  while  it  subjects 
the  subject  to  the  state,  equally  subjects  the  state  to  the  Divine 
sovereignty.  Take  away  the  subjection  of  the  state  to  God,  and 
you  take  away  the  reason  of  the  subjection  of  the  subject  to  the 
state  ;  and  we  need  not  tell  you  that  to  subject  us  to  an  author- 
ity w^hich  we  are  not  bound  to  obey  is  tyranny.  See,  then, 
what  you  get  by  denying  the  supremacy  of  the  Church  in 
temporals  ! 

The  Church  and  the  state,  as  administrations,  are  distinct 
bodies ;  but  they  are  not,  as  some  modern  politicians  would 
persuade  us,  two  coordinate  and  mutually  independent  author- 
ities. The  state  holds  under  the  law  of  nature,  and  has  author- 
ity only  within  the  limits  of  that  law.     As  long  as  it  confines 


284  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

itself  within  that  law,  and  faithfully  executes  its  provisions,  it 
acts  freely,  without  ecclesiastical  restraint  or  interference.  But 
the  Church  holds  from  God  under  the  supernatural  or  revealed 
law,  which  incUides,  as  integral  in  itself,  the  law  of  nature,  and 
is  therefore  the  teacher  and  guardian  of  the  natural  as  well  as 
of  the  revealed  law.  She  is,  under  God,  the  supreme  judge  of 
both  laws,  which  for  her  are  but  one  law ;  and  hence  she  takes 
cognizance,  in  her  tribunals,  of  the  breaches  of  the  natural  law 
as  well  as  of  the  revealed,  and  has  the  right  to  take  cognizance 
of  its  breaches  by  nations  as  well  as  of  its  breaches  by  indi\nd- 
uals,  by  the  prince  as  well  as  by  the  subject,  for  it  is  the  supreme 
law  for  both.  The  state  is,  therefore,  only  an  inferior  court, 
bound  to  receive  the  law  from  the  supreme  court,  and  liable  to 
have  its  decisions  reversed  on  appeal. 

This  must  be  asserted,  if  we  assert  the  supremacy  of  the 
Christian  law,  and  hold  the  Church  to  be  its  teacher  and  judge ; 
for  no  man  will  deny  that  Christianity  includes  the  natural  as 
well  as  the  supernatural  law.  Who,  with  any  just  conceptions, 
or  any  conceptions  at  all,  of  the  Christian  religion,  will  pretend 
that  one  can  fulfil  the  Christian  law  and  yet  violate  the  natural 
law  ? — that  one  is  a  good  Christian,  if  he  keeps  the  precepts  of 
the  Church,  though  he  break  every  precept  of  the  Decalogue  ? 
— or  that  Christianity  remits  the  catechumen  to  the  state  to 
learn  the  law  of  nature,  or  what  we  term  natural  morality  ? 
Grace  presupposes  nature.  The  supernatural  ordinances  of  God's 
law  presup[)Oses  the  natural,  and  the  Church,  which  is  the 
teacher  and  guardian  of  faith  and  morals,  can  no  more  be  so 
without  plenary  authority  with  regard  to  the  latter  than  the 
former.  Who,  again,  dares  pretend  that  the  moral  law  is  not 
as  obligatory  on  emperors,  kings,  princes,  commonwealths,  as 
upon  private  individuals  ? — upon  politicians,  as  upon  priests  or 
simple  believers  ?  Unless,  then,  you  exempt  the  state  from  all 
obligation  even  to  the  law  of  nature,  you  must  make  it  amena- 
ble to  the  moral  law  as  expounded  by  the  Church,  divinely 
commissioned  to  teach  and  declare  it. 

Deny  this,  and  assert  the  independence  of  the  political  order, 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  285 

and  declare  the  state  in  its  own  right,  without  acco  mtability  to 
the  Christian  law,  of  which  it  is  not  the  teacher  or  guardian,  su- 
preme in  temporals,  and  you  gain,  instead  of  civil  liberty,  sim- 
ply, in  principle  at  least,  civil  despotism.  If  you  deny  that  the 
Church  is  the  teacher  and  guardian  of  the  law  of  God,  you  must 
either  claim  the  authority  you  deny  her  for  the  state,  or  you 
must  deny  it  altogether.  If  you  claim  it  for  the  state,  you,  on 
your  own  principles,  make  the  state  a  spiritual  despotism,  and 
on  ours  also  ;  for  the  state  obviously  has  not  received  that  au- 
thority, is  incompetent  in  spirituals,  is  no  teacher  of  morals,  or 
director  of  consciences.  If  you  deny  it  altogether,  you  make 
the  state  independent  of  the  moral  order,  independent  of  the 
Divine  sovereignty,  the  only  real  sovereignty,  and  establish  pure, 
unmitigated  civil  despotism. 

There  is  no  escaping  this  conclusion ;  and  hence  we  see  the 
folly  and  madness  of  those  who  assert  in  the  name  of  libei*ty  the 
independence  of  the  political  order,  and  exclaim,  in  a  tone  of 
mock  heroism,  "  Neither  priest  nor  bishop  shall  interfere  with 
my  political  opinions  as  long  as  I  am  able  to  resist  him  ! "  Bra- 
vo !  my  young  Liberal ;  but  did  you  know  what  you  are  doing, 
you  would  see  that  you  are  laying  the  foundation,  not  of  liberty, 
but  of  despotism.  Hence,  too,  we  see  that  our  author  must  be 
mistaken,  when  he  asserts  that  the  Protestant  Reformation,  in 
its  essential  principle,  was  "  a  revolt  of  free  spirits  against  profli- 
gate despotism."  It  was  no  such  thing.  Its  objections  to  the 
Church,  reduced  to  their  substance,  were  simply,  the  Church  is 
a  spiritual  despotism  because  she  claims  supremacy  over  reason, 
conscience,  and  the  state ;  and  it  objected  to  her,  not  because 
it  was  she  who  claimed  that  supremacy,  but  because  it  rejected 
the  supremacy  itself,  let  it  be  claimed  by  whom  it  might.  This 
our  author  himself  concedes,  contends,  and  proves.  Its  argu 
ment  was,  the  Church  of  God  cannot  claim  supremacy  over  rea- 
son, conscience,  and  the  state.  But  the  Church  does  claim  this 
supremacy,  therefore  she  cannot  be  the  Church  of  God.  The 
principle  of  the  argument  is,  that  God  could  not  delegate  the 
authority  to  any  Church.     But  if  he  could  not,  it  must  have 


286  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

been  because  lie  himself  did  not  possess  it.  Therefore  the 
essential  principle  of  the  Reformation,  in  the  last  analysis,  ^vas 
the  denial,  on  the  one  hand,  of  the  sovereignty  of  God  over 
reason,  conscience,  and  the  state,  and  on  the  other,  the  assertion 
of  the  absolute  independence  of  man  and  the  temporal  order, 
which  is  either  pure  license  or  pure  despotism,  according  to  the 
light  in  which  you  choose  to  consider  it.  The  real  character  of 
the  Reformation  was  the  substitution  of  human  sovereignty  for 
the  Divine ;  and  hence,  in  its  developments,  wherever  it  is  free 
to  follow  its  own  law,  we  see  it  result  either  in  pure  humanism 
or  pure  pantheism,  as  it  does  or.  does  not  combine  with  religious 
sentiment.  And  either  is  the  denial  of  both  authority  and  lib- 
erty ;  for  all  authority  is  in  the  Divine  sovereignty,  and  all  lib- 
erty in  being  bound  to  it  alone,  that  is,  in  freedom  from  all 
human  government  resting  merely  on  a  human  basis,  whether 
ourselves,  the  one,  the  few,  or  the  many,  as  every  one  would 
see,  if  it  were  understood  that  authority  over  myself,  emanating 
from  myself,  is  as  human,  and  therefore  as  illegitimate,  as  much 
of  the  essence  of  despotism,  as  authority  over  me  emanating 
from  other  men.  Is  it  not  said  in  all  languages  that  a  man  may 
be  the  slave  of  himself,  of  his  own  passions,  his  own  ignorance, 
or  his  own  prejudices  ?  Under  Protestantism  we  may  have 
civil  and  spiritual  despotism,  or  civil  and  spiritual  license,  the 
only  two  things  that  man  can  found,  without  a  divine  commis- 
sion and  subjection  to  the  divine  law ;  but  authority  and  liberty 
are  possible  and  can  be  practically  secured  only  under  the  divine 
order  represented  by  the  Church,  or  an  institution  precisely  sim 
ilar  to  what  she  professes  to  be,  the  divinely  commissioned 
teacher  and  guardian  of  both  the  natural  and  the  revealed  law. 

That  this  conclusion  will  be  acceptable  to  our  politicians, 
young  or  old,  we  are  not  quite  so  simple  as  to  suppose ;  but  we 
are  not  aware  that  it  is  necessary  to  consult  their  pleas\n-e. 
They  have  in  these,  as  they  had  in  other  times,  the  physical 
power  to  do  with  us  as  seems  to  them  good.  They  can  decry 
us,  they  can  pull  out  our  tongue,  cut  off  our  right  hand,  and  at 
need  burn  our  body,  or  cast  it  to  the  wild  beasts ;  but  this  will 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  287 

not  alter  the  nature  of  things,  make  wrong  right,  or  right  wrono-. 
Civil  and  spiritual  despotism  is  not  the  less  despotism  because 
practised  by  them,  and  in  the  name  of  humanity  and  the  peo- 
ple. We  desire  to  have  all  due  respect  for  thciii  ;  but  we  njust 
confess  that  we  have  not  yet  sppu  their  title-deeds,  the  pa])eis 
which  prove  them  to  have  a  chartered  right  from  Almighty  God 
to  be  the  sole  governoi-s  of  mankind.  We  have  no  authority  for 
pronouncing  them  infalhble  or  impeccable;  we  have  seen  no 
reason  for  supposing  their  ascendency,  fi-eed  from  the  restraints 
of  the  Divine  law,  is  either  honorable  to  God  or  serviceable  to 
man  ;  we  have  not  found  them  always  exempt  from  the  common 
infirmities  of  our  nature ;  and  we  think  we  have  seen,  at  least 
heard  of,  politicians  who  wei-e  ambitious,  selfish,  intriguino-, 
greedy  of  power,  place,  emolument  even.  In  a  word,  we  have 
no  reason  to  believe  that  they  monopohze  all  the  wisdom,  the 
virtue,  the  generosity  and  disinterestedness  of  the  community, 
or  that  they  never  need  looking  after,  and  therefore  never  need 
a  power  above  them,  under  the  immediate  and  supernatural  pro- 
tection of  Almighty  God,  to  look  after  them,  and  to  compel 
them  to  keep  within  their  own  pro\ince,  to  respect  religion,  and 
to  refain  from  inflicting  irreparable  injuries  upon  society.  Even 
should  they,  then,  clamor  against  us,  or  do  worse,  it  would  not 
greatly  move  us,  and  would  tend  to  confirm  us  in  the  ti-uth  of 
our  doctrine,  rather  than  lead  us  to  distrust  its  soundness  or  its 
necessity. 

We  need  hardly  say  that  w^e  advocate  no  amalgamation  of 
the  civil  and  ecclesiastical  administrations.  They  are  in  their 
nature,  as  we  have  said,  distinct,  and  the  supremacy  of  the 
Church  which  we  assert  is  by  no  means  the  supremacy  of  the 
clergy  as  politicians.  We  have  no  more  respect  for  clergymen 
turned  politicians  than  w^e  have  for  any  other  class  of  politicians 
of  equal  worth,  perhaps  not  quite  so  much  ;  for  we  cannot  forget 
that  they,  in  becoming  politicians,  descend  from  their  sr.cei'dotal 
rank,  as  a  judge  does  in  descending  from  the  bench  to  play  tlie 
part  of  an  advocate.  We  have  had  political  priests  ever  since 
there  was  a  Christian  state,  and  many  of  them  have  made  sad 


288  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

work  of  both  politics  and  religion.  We  have  nothing  to  say  of 
thera,  but  that  they  were  politicians,  and  their  censurable  acts  - 
were  not  performed  in  their  character  of  priests.  The  principle  we 
assert  does  not  exact  that  the  Church  should  turn  politician,  and 
thus  from  the  Church  become  the  state,  or  that  the  clergy  should 
turn  politicians ;  it  exacts  that  both  she  and  they  should  not. 
The  clergy  as  politicians  fall  into  the  category  of  all  politicians, 
and  their  supremacy  as  politicians  would  still  be  the  supremacy 
of  the  state,  not  of  the  Church.  The  state  is  supreme,  if  poli- 
ticians as  such  be  supreme,  let  them  be  selected  from  what  class 
of  the  community  they  ma3\  The  principle  exacts,  indeed,  the 
supremacy  of  the  clergy,  but  solely  as  the  Church,  in  their 
sacerdotal  and  pastoral  character  as  teachers,  guardians,  and 
judges  of  the  law  of  God,  natural  and  revealed,  supreme  for  in- 
dividuals and  nations,  for  prince  and  subject,  king  and  common- 
wealth, noble  and  plebeian,  rich  and  poor,  great  and  small,  wise 
and  simple  ;  not  as  politicians,  in  which  character  they  have  and 
can  have  no  preeminence  over  politicians  selected  from  the  laity, 
and  must  stand  on  the  same  level  with  them.  We  do  not  advo- 
cate— far  from  it — the  notion  that  the  Church  must  administer 
the  civil  government ;  what  we  advocate  is  her  supremacy  as  the 
teacher  and  guardian  of  the  law  of  God, — as  the  supreme  court, 
which  must  be  recognized  and  submitted  to  as  such  by  the  state, 
and  whose  decisions  cannot  be  disregarded,  whose  prerogatives 
cannot  be  abridged  or  usurped  by  any  power  on  earth,  without 
rebellion  against  the  Divine  majesty,  and  robbing  man  of  his 
rights.  As  Christians,  we  must  insist  on  this  supremac}^ ;  as 
Catholics,  it  is  not  only  our  duty,  but  our  glorious  privilege,  to 
assert  it,  and  to  understand  and  practise  our  religion  as  God 
himself,  through  his  own  chosen  organ,  promulgates  and  ex- 
pounds it. 

We  know  how  hateful  this  doctrine  is  to  politicians,  to  the 
world,  and  to  the  devil,  who  seek  always  to  find  a  rival  in  the 
state  to  the  kingdom  of  God.  We  know  that  the  representatives 
of  the  state  in  nearly  all  ages  of  Christendom,  and  in  nearly  all 
nations,  have  resisted  it,  and  been    encouraged,   sustained,  in 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  289 

their  resistance,  by  ambi.ioiis  priests  and  courtly  prelates.  We 
know  that  it  is  now  resisted  by  every  civil  govei'nment  on  earth, 
that  the  kings  of  the  earth  stand  up,  the  princes  conspire  to- 
gether, the  nations  rage,  and  the  people  imagine  vain  things, 
against  the  Lord  and  against  his  Christ,  saying,  Let  us  break 
their  bonds  asunder,  let  us  cast  away  their  yoke  from  us  ;  but 
we  cannot  help  that.  We  know  the  truth,  and  dare  assert  it ; 
we  know  the  rights  of  God,  and  dare  not  betray  them.  We 
cannot  be  false,  because  others  are, — shrink  from  proclaiming 
the  supremacy  of  the  moral  order,  because  now  more  than  ever 
it  is  necessary  to  proclaim  it.  We  do  not  understand  the  hero- 
ism that  goes  always  with  the  popular  party,  or  the  loyalty  that 
deserts  to  the  enemy  the  moment  that  his  forces  appear  to  be 
the  most  numerous.  We  know  the  moral  order  is  supreme,  and 
shall  we  fear  to  say  it,  lest  sinners  tremble,  the  wicked  gnash 
their  teeth,  and  the  multitude  threaten  ?  We  know  our  Church 
is  God's  Church ;  that  she  is  the  judge  of  God's  law,  and  has 
the  right  to  denounce,  as  from  the  judgment-seat  of  the  Al» 
mighty,  whoever  violates  it,  and  to  place  king  or  peasant  under 
her  anathema,  if  he  refuses  to  obey  it.  She  has  the  right,  the 
divine  right,  to  denounce  moral  wrong,  spiritual  wrong,  political 
wrong,  tyranny  and  oppression,  wheresoever  or  by  whomsoever 
they  are  practised,  and  to  vindicate  the  rights  of  God,  and,  in  so 
doing,  the  rights  of  man,  let  who  will  dare  threaten  or  invade 
them.  We  are  subject  to  God,  but  to  him  only  ;  and  are  we 
afraid  to  assert  the  fact  ?     Are  we  not  free  before  all  men  ? 

The  Church  is  the  Dinnely  appointed  guardian  of  truth,  vir- 
tue, liberty,  because  she  is  the  representative  of  the  Divine  sov- 
ereignty on  earth.  Kings  and  potentates,  commonwealths  and 
mobs,  may  rise  up,  as  they  have  often  risen  up,  against  her ; 
pohticians  may  murmur  or  denounce,  the  timid  may  quake,  the 
faint-hearted  may  fail,  the  cowardly  shrink  away,  and  the  dis- 
loyal join  her  persecutors  ;  but  that  can  neither  justify  them, 
nor  unmake  her  rights,  nor  depose  her  from  her  sovereignty 
under  God, — cannot  make  it  not  true  that  she  represents  the 
moral  order,  and  that  the  moral  order  is  supreme.  That  su- 
13 


290  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

premacy  is  a  fact  in  God's  universe,  an  eternal  and  primal  truth ; 
and  let  no  man  dare  deny  it,  who  would  not  be  branded  on  his 
forehead  traitor  to  God,  and  therefore  to  man  ;  and  let  him  who 
fears  to  assert  it  in  the  hour  of  thickest  danger  be  branded  pol- 
troon.    It  is  the  glory  of  the  Church  that  she  has  always  assert- 
ed it.     She  asserted  it  in  that  noble  answer  of  her  inspired 
Apostles  to  the  magistrates, — "  We  must  obey  God  rather  than 
men  ;"  she  asserted  it  in  her  glorious   army  of  martyrs,  who 
chose  rather  to  die  at  the  stake,  in  the  amphitheatre,  under  the 
most  cruel  and  lingering  tortures,  than  to  offer  incense  to  Jupiter 
or  to  the  statue  of  Caesar  ;  she  asserted  it  by  the  mouth  of  holy 
Ambrose,  Archbishop  of  Milan,  when  he  forbade  the  emperor 
Theodosius  the  Great  to  enter  the  Church  till  he  had  done  pub- 
lic penance  for  his  tyrannical  treatment  of  his  subjects,  and 
drove  him  from  the  sanctuary,  and  bade  him  take  his  place  with  ' 
the  laity,  where  he  belonged ;  she  asserted  it  in  the  person  of 
her  sovereign  Pontiff,  St.  Gregory  the  Seventh,  when  he  made 
the  tyrant  and  brutal  Henry  the  Fourth  of  Germany  wait  for 
three  days  shivering  with  cold  and  hunger  at  his  door,  before  he 
would  grant  him  absolution,  and  when  he  finally  smote  him 
with  the  sword  of  Peter  and  Paul  for  his  violation  of  his  oaths, 
his  wars  against  religion,  and  his  oppression  of  his  subjects  ;  and 
she  asserted  it,  again,  in  the  person  of  her  glorious  Pontiff,  Gre- 
gory the   Sixteenth,  who,  standing  with  one  foot  in  the  grave, 
confronted  the  tyrant  of  the  North,  and  made  the  Autocrat  of 
all  the  Russias  tremble  and  weep  as  a  child.     Never  for  one  mo- 
ment has  she  ceased  to  assert  it  in  face  of  crowned  and  un- 
crowned heads,— Jew,  Pagan,  Arian,  Barbarian,  Saracen,  Prot- 
estant, Infidel,  Monarchist,  Aristocrat,  Democrat ;  and  gloriously 
is  she  asserting  it  now  in  her  noble  confessor,  the  Bishop  of 
Lausanne  and  Geneva,  and  in  her  exiled  Pontiff,  Pius  the  Ninth. 
You  talk  of  religious  liberty.     Know   you   what    the    word 
means  ?     Know  ye  that  religious  liberty  is  all  and  entire  in  the 
supremacy  of  the  moral  order  ?     The  Church  is  a  spii-itual  des- 
potism, is  she  ?     Bold  blasphemer,  miserable  apologist  for  ty- 
rants and  tyranny,  go  trace  her  track  through  eighteen  hundred 


AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY.  291 

years,  and  behold  it  marked  with  the  blood  of  her  free  and  no- 
ble-hearted children,  whom  God  loves  and  honors,  shed  in  defence 
of  religious  liberty.  From  the  first  moment  of  her  existence  has 
she  fought,  ay,  fought  as  no  other  power  can  fight,  for  liberty  of 
religion.  Every  land  has  been  reddened  with  the  blood  and 
whitened  with  the  bones  of  her  martyrs,  in  that  sacred  cause ; 
and  now,  rash  upstart,  you  dare  in  the  face  of  day  proclaim  her 
the  friend  of  despotism !  Alas !  my  brother,  may  God  forgive 
you,  for  you  know  not  what  you  do. 

But  we  have  said  enough  to  show  the  unchristian  as  well  as 
the  unphilosophical  character  of  our  author's  thought,  which  we 
are  willing  to  believe  he  does  not  fully  comprehend,  and  from 
the  logical  consequences  of  w^hich,  w^ere  he  to  see  them,  we  are 
anxious  to  believe  he  is  prepared  to  recoil  with  horror.  His 
thought  is  unphilosophical,  because  it  conceives  authority  and 
liberty  as  antagonists  ;  it  is  unchristian,  because  it  reduces  Chris- 
tianity to  mere  Rationalism,  and  revives  Alexandrian  Gentilism ; 
because  it  denies  the  Divine  sovereignty,  and  the  supremacy  in 
all  things  of  the  spiritual  or  moral  order ;  because  it  denies 
moral  accountability,  and  involves  unmitigated  despotism  or  un- 
bounded license  as  the  inevitable  doom  of  the  human  race.  As 
a  philosopher,  we  hold  his  work  in  contempt;  as  an  historian, 
we  deny  its  authenticity;  as  a  Christian,  we  abhor  it;  as  a 
friend  of  liberty,  civil  and  religious,  we  denounce  its  principles,  as 
fit  only  for  despots  or  libertines. 

There  are  matters  of  detail  in  the  work  to  which  we  seriously 
object,  but,  as  we  have  shown  the  unsoundness  of  the  book  in 
its  principles,  it  is  not  worth  while  to  waste  time  or  argument  in 
exposing  them.  The  author  has  expended  no  inconsiderable 
thought  and  labor  in  constructing  his  work,  but,  hke  all  the 
works  which  rank  under  the  head  of  philosophy  of  history,  it  is 
shallow,  vague,  confused,  worthless.  The  writers  of  philosophy 
of  history  may  have  great  natural  talents,  they  may  have  varied 
and  extensive  learning,  but  they  start  wrong,  they  attempt  what 
is  impossible,  and  never  go  to  the  bottom  of  things  or  rise  to 
their  first  principles.     They  never  reach  the  ultimate  ;  they  never 


292  AUTHORITY    AND    LIBERTY. 

attain  to  science ;  and  only  amuse  or  bewilder  us  with  vague 
generalities,  crude  speculations,  or  unmeaning  verbiage.  There 
is  an  order  of  thought  of  which  they  have  no  conception,  infin- 
itely more  profound  than  theirs,  which,  when  once  attained  to, 
makes  all  their  views  appear  heterogeneous,  confused,  w^eak,  and 
childish. 

We  have  no  disposition  to  treat  our  young  Kentuckian  rudely, 
or  to  discourage  him  by  an  unkind  reception.  We  know  him 
only  through  his  book.  His  book  is  bad,  but  we  every  day  re- 
ceive works  which  are  far  worse.  We  do  not  believe  that  he 
means  to  be  a  Pagan  ;  we  do  not  believe  that  he  even  means  to 
be  a  RationaUst ;  we  are  sure  that  he  does  not  mean  to  deny 
the  moral  order ;  and  this  is  much  for  him  personally,  but  it  is 
nothing  for  his  book.  In  judging  the  man,  we  look  to  his  in- 
tention ;  in  judging  the  author,  we  look  only  to  the  principles 
he  inculcates.  If  these  are  unsound  or  dangerous,  we  have  no 
mercy  for  the  author,  though  we  may  abound  in  charity  for  the 
man.  Mr.  Nourse  does  not  understand  his  own  principles  ;  he 
has  not  seen  them  in  all  their  relations,  and  does  not  suspect 
their  logical  consequences.  He  has  undertaken,  without  other 
guide  than  a  few  books  which,  themselves  unsafe  guides,  he  has 
read,  but  not  digested,  to  do.  after  the  study  of  a  few  months, 
what  no  mortal  man  could  accomplish  with  all  the  libraries  in 
the  world,  were  he  to  live  longer  than  the  world  has  stood. 
How  could  he  expect  to  succeed  ?  We  hold  him  accountable 
for  his  rashness  in  undertaking  such  a  task,  not  for  having  failed 
in  its  accomplishment. 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  293 

POLITICAL   CONSTITUTIONS.* 

OCTOBER,    1847. 

Count  Joseph  de  Maistre  was  among  the  most  distin- 
guished men  of  his  age.  He  was  born  at  Chamberri  in  Savoy, 
1*753,  was  a  senator  of  Piedmont  at  the  time  of  the  French 
invasion  in  1792,  and  resided  at  St.  Petersburg,  as  the  ambas- 
sador of  the  king  of  Sardinia,  from  1804  to  1817,  in  which  last 
year  he  returned  to  Turin,  where  he  died  in  1821.  Though 
not  a  subject  of  France,  he  was  descended  from  a  French 
family ;  was  peculiarly  French  in  his  geniiLs  as  well  as  his  lan- 
guage, and  his  works  were  all  written  in  reference  to  French 
ideas  and  affairs  at  the  time  of  their  composition.  No  one 
among  those  who  labored  during  the  first  years  of  this  century 
to  revive  and  restore  French  literature,  perverted  by  the  phil- 
osophers, and  nearly  destroyed  by  the  Revolution,  deserves  a 
more  honorable  mention,  or  exerted  a  more  salutary  influence 
in  exposing  the  popular  fallacies  of  the  day,  and  in  recalling 
men's  minds  to  deeper  and  sounder  religious  and  political  doc- 
trines. 

As  a  theologian,  some  may  think  that  he  placed  too  much 
rehance  on  the  analogies  his  profound  and  varied  erudition  sup- 
plied him  with  between  the  principles  of  our  holy  religion  and 
those  which  were  acknowledged  in  the  old  heathen  world,  that  he 
was  more  fond  than  is  prudent  in  these  times  of  citing  pagan 
authorities  for  his  doctrines,  and  that  he  gave  an  almost  unor- 
thodox application  to  the  dictum  of  St.  Vincent  of  Lerins,  quod 
semper,  quod  ubique,  et  ah  omnibus ;  but  it  cannot  be  denied 
that  his  works  were  peculiarly  adapted  to  the  temper  of  the 
times  in  which  they  were  written,  and  admirably  fitted  to  ex- 
cite and  engage  the  attention  of  a  lively  people  grown  weary 

*  Essay  on  the  Generative  Principle  of  Political  Constitutions 
Translated  from  the  French  of  M.  Le  Compte  Joseph  de  Maistre. 
Boston  :  Little  &  Brown.     1847.     16mo.     pp.  173. 


294  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

indeed  of  infidelity,  anarchy,  and  military  despotism,  but  not 
yet  recovered  from  the  habits  of  incredulity  and  impiety,  of 
sneering  at  the  priest  and  the  altar,  and  of  regarding  Christian- 
ity as  old  and  effete ;  or  that,  if  they  contain  some  things  local 
and  temporary  in  their  interest  they  still  contain  much  that  is 
universal  and  permanent,  which  may  be  profitably  studied  in 
every  age  and  country.  No  one  acquainted  with  them  can 
hesitate  to  regard  them  as  peculiarly  appropriate  to  our  own 
country,  and  worthy  the  serious  attention  of  our  people,  whether 
Catholic  or  I*rotestant. 

The  analogies  between  the  principles  of  our  holy  religion  and 
those  of  the  ancient  world,  on  which  Count  de  Maistre  lays 
great  stress  in  all  his  works,  are  undeniable ;  but  if  we  adduce 
them  without  taking  gi-eat  care  to  mark  their  precise  nature, 
and  the  precise  purpose  for  which  we  adduce  them,  Ave  are  in 
danger  of  giving  occasion  to  an  argument  unf  ivorable  to  Chris- 
tianity. German  neologists  and  their  American  followers,  it  is 
well  known,  appeal  to  these  analogies,  and  attempt  from  them 
to  construct  an  argument  against  Christianity  as  a  positive  re- 
vealed religion,  or  against  the  special  divine  inspiration  of  the 
Holy  Scriptures,  and  in  favor  of  their  pernicious  error,  that  in- 
spiration, so  far  as  it  is  to  be  admitted  at  all,  is  a  universal  phe- 
nomenon, not  peculiar,  unless  it  be  in  degree,  to  certain  indi- 
viduals, but  common  to  all  men  in  all  countries  and  ages  of  the 
^vorld, — that  God  speaks  objectively  to  no  one,  but  reveals  sub- 
jectively, in  their  spiritual  nature,  reason,  conscience,  sentiment, 
the  same  great  truths  to  all.  Hence  they  conclude  that  all 
religion  is  natural,  if  we  consider  the  fact  that  it  is  common  to 
all  men,  and  resulting  spontaneously  from  universal  humanity, — 
or  supernatural,  if  we  consider  the  fact  that  our  nature  lives 
and  operates  only  in  God,  and  through  the  creative  and  uphold- 
ing power  and  wisdom  of  God,  who  is  himself  above  nature. 
All  rehgions,  say  they,  are  therefore  at  bottom  one  and  the 
same,  natural  or  supernatural  according  to  the  point  of  view 
from  which  we  choose  to  consider  them ;  and  they  differ  as 
concrete  religions  only  according  to,  and  in  consequence  of,  the 


POLITICAL    COXSTITUTIONS.  295 

differing  degrees  of  mental  and  moral  culture  of  mankind  in 
different  ages,  countries,  and  individuals.  To  get  at  the  perfect 
form  of  religion,  we  must  eliminate  whatever  is  local,  tempo- 
rary, peculiar  to  this  or  that  individual,  to  this  or  that  age  or 
country,  and  seize  upon  that  which  has  been  held  always,  every- 
where, and  by  all.  What  we  thus  obtain,  the  residuum  which 
remains  after  this  analysis,  will  be  absolute  rehgion  ;  that  is  to 
say,  all  religions  in  general,  and  no  religion  in  particular,  like 
man  without  men,  the  race  without  individuals ! 

No  man  was  ever  farther  from  adopting  this  gross  absurdity, 
or  of  countenancing  this  religious  nihilism,  than  Count  de  Mais- 
tre  ;  but  we  sometimes  feel,  while  reading  his  learned  and  bril- 
liant pages,  that  he  has  not  been  always  careful  to  guard  against 
it,  and  that  he  says  many  things  which  could,  without  much 
difficulty,  be  construed  in  its  favor.  He  does  not  appear  to  us 
to  state  clearly  always  the  precise  purpose  for  which  he  adduces 
these  analogies,  or  the  precise  grounds  on  wdiich  he  ascribes  to 
them  the  value  he  evidently  supposes  them  to  possess.  In  a 
word,  he  does  not  appear  to  have  marked  with  precision  the 
place  which  belongs  to  the  consensus  hominum,  and  seems  at 
times  to  hold  it  to  be  the  ground  of  certainty,  and  to  favor  the 
notion  that  the  Church  is  authoritative  for  the  reason  that  she 
is  the  organ  through  which  the  universal  consent  of  the  race  ex- 
presses itself,  and  therefore  to  favor  the  heresy  taught  a  short 
time  after  by  De  Lammenais.  Yet  it  is  only  in  appearance  ; 
for  in  his  thought,  though  not  always  sufficiently  guarded  in  his 
expression,  we  are  sure  he  was  sound  and  orthodox. 

If  we  appeal  to  these  analogies  to  show  what  has  always  been 
the  reason  or  belief  of  mankind,  and,  from  the  fact  that  mankind 
have  aUvays  assented  to  principles  identical  with  the  principles 
of  Christianity,  or  analogous  to  them,  conclude  the  truth  of  the 
Christianity  as  a  divinely  revealed  religion,  we  fall  into  the  error 
of  De  Lammenais,  condemned  as  heretical ;  because  we  then 
make  the  consensus  hominun  the  ground  of  certainty,  the  au- 
thority for  believing,  instead  of  the  veracity  of  God,  as  required 
by  faith.     But,  if  we  adduce  them  as  authorities,  not  for  faith, 


296  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

but  for  what  is  and  always  has  been  the  practical  reason  or  com- 
mon sense  of  mankind,  and  therefore  as  proofs  that  the  princi- 
ples of  our  holy  religion  are  not  unreasonable,  but  reasonable, 
our  method  is  perfectly  legitimate,  and  perhaps  the  very  best 
that  can  be  adopted  against  the  unbeliever.  It  is  only  in  this 
latter  sense,  we  are  confident,  that  Count  de  Maistre,  in  reality, 
appeals  to  the  consensus  hominum  and  adduces  the  analogies  in 
C|uestion. 

The  unbeliever,  born  and  bred  in  Christian  lands,  professes  to 
meet  the  Christian  on  the  ground  of  reason,  and  from  reason 
alone  to  disprove  the  Christian  religion ;  that  is,  he  objects  that 
Christianity  is  contrary  to  reason.  But  in  order  to  sustain  his 
objection,  he  must  prove  that  Christianity  is  contradicted,  either 
by  the  pure  or  demonstrative  reason,  or  by  the  practical  or 
moral  reason  ;  that  is,  either  by  reason  as  the  principle  of  meta- 
physical certainty,  or  by  reason  as  the  principle  of  moral  cer- 
tainty. The  first  is  out  of  the  question  ;  for  reason  in  the  former 
seiise, — the  speculative  reason  of  Kant, — as  Kant  himself  has 
shown  in  his  Kritik  der  reinen  Veriiunft,  cannot  affirm  or  deny 
any  thing  on  the  subject.  Moreover,  it  has  been  proved,  over 
and  over  again,  tliat  there  is  nothing  in  Christianity  which  con- 
tradicts any  principle  of  speculative  reason  ;  and  all  the  chiefs 
of  the  modern  infidel  school,  Bayle,  Voltaire,  D'Alembert,  Hume, 
and  Thomas  Paine,  concede  that  it  is  impossible  to  prove  any 
thing,  metaphysically,  against  Christianity.  "  They  themselves," 
says  Benjamin  Constant,  an  unsuspicious  authority  on  this  point, 
"acknowledge  that  reasoning  can  authorize  only  doubt."* 
They  can  only  say  they  do  not  believe  it,  or  that  there  is  no 
suflficient  reason  for  believing  it ;  but  no  one  of  them  ventures  to 
say  that  it  must  necessarily  be  false,  or  that,  after  all,  it  may  not 
be  true.  So  far  as  regards  the  speculative  reason,  it  is  certain, 
that,  if  reason  cannot,  as  we  concede  it  cannot,  pronounce  a 
judgment  in  favor  of  our  religion,  it  cannot  pronounce  a  judg- 
ment against  it.  It  can  and  must  concede  its  metaphysical  possi- 
bility, and  this  is  as  far  as  it  can  go,  either  one  way  or  the  other. 
*  De  la  Religion,  Tom.  1.  p.  7.     Paris,  1824. 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  297 

The  unbeliever,  then,  nni^t  leave  the  speculative  reason,  and 
show  that  our  religion  is  condemned  by  the  practical  reason,  or 
withdraw  his  objection.  But  the  criterion  of  the  practical  reason 
is  the  consensus  hoyninum.  In  speculative  reason  the  individual 
needs  not  to  go  out  of  himself,  for  the  speculative  reason  in  se 
is  as  perfect  in  one  as  it  is  in  all  men  ;  and  when  I  have  demon- 
strated that  the  three  angles  of  the  triangle  are  equal  to  two 
right  angles,  I  have  no  need  of  the  assent  of  the  race,  and  their 
assent  can  add  nothing  to  the  demonstration,  or  to  the  certainty 
of  the  fact.  But  in  regard  to  the  practical  reason  it  is  not  so  ; 
for  this  may  be  warped  or  perverted  by  individual  idiosyncrasies, 
ignorance,  education,  position,  passions,  prejudices.  Here  the 
individual  reason  must  be  rectified  or  verified  by  the  reason  of 
the  race,  and  that  only  is  the  reason  of  the  race  which  is  held 
always,  everywhere,  and  by  all.  Hence  we  say  the  consensus 
hominum  is  the  criterion  of  the  practical  reason,  and  the  author- 
ity on  which  this  or  that  is  to  be  taken, — not  as  divine  revela- 
tion, for  that  is  the  error  to  be  avoided,  but  as  practical  reason  ; 
for  certainly  that  is  not  unreasonable,  contrary  to  the  practical 
reason,  which  the  race  universally  assents  to,  but  must  be  in  ac- 
cordance with  it,  and  demanded  by  it  ;  or  else  the  race  would 
not  and  could  not  have  universally  assented  to  it.  The  consen- 
sus hominum  is  not  the  ground  for  believing  this  or  that  to  be 
revealed,  but  simply  for  believing  it  approved  by  the  practical 
reason  ;  and  if  it  is  approved  by  the  practical  reason,  we  beheve 
it  on  the  authority  of  that  reason, — not  fide  divina,  indeed,  but 
fide  humana, — and  must  do  so,  or  prove  ourselves  unreasonable, 
be  ourselves  condemned  by  reason. 

Now  if  the  unbeliever  fails,  as  he  does,  to  show  that  there  is 
something  essential  to  the  Christian  religion  repugned  by  the 
practical  reason,  he  fails  entirely  to  sustain  his  objection.  He 
boasts  of  common  sense,  but  common  sense  is  only  another  name 
for  what  we  call  the  practical  reason.  He  says  our  rehgion  con- 
tradicts common  sense.  But  his  assertion  is  worth  nothing,  un- 
less he  proves  it  by  showing  the  contradiction  ;  w^hich  he  never 
does  and  never  can  do.     But  if,  on  the  other  hand,  we  prove  to 


298  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

him  that  every  one  of  the  principles  of  our  religion  has  the  au- 
thority of  common  sense,  or  that  in  believing  our  religion  we 
assent  to  nothing  not  assented  to  in  principle  always  and  every- 
where by  the  race,  we  prove  that  our  religion  in  principle  is 
reasonable,  that  the  unbeliever  cannot  object  that  it  is  unreason- 
able, and  that  he,  if  he  denies  its  principles,  is  himself  unreason- 
able, obnoxious  to  the  precise  objeclion  which  he  brings 
against  us. 

This  last  is  what  Count  de  Maistre  has  done.  He  proves,  by 
admirable  philosophical  analysis  and  rare  erudition,  that  there  is 
in  our  holy  religion  no  principle  which  the  race  has  not  always 
and  everywhere  assented  to,  and  therefore,  that,  in  refusing  to 
believe  it,  in  rejecting  its  principles,  we  are  rejecting  not  merely 
the  word  of  God  as  handed  down  to  us  by  the  Church,  but  also 
the  practical  reason  or  common  sense  of  mankind,  and  by  doing 
so  place  ourselves  in  direct  hostility  to  the  reason  we  boast, 
and  whose  authority  we  acknowledge.  He  thus  turns  the  tables 
upon  the  loud-boasting  and  conceited  infidel,  and  shows  him  that 
it  is  he,  not  the  Christian,  who  must  humble  himself  before  rea- 
son, and  beg  pardon  for  the  outrages  he  offers  her.  The  unbe- 
liever, in  fact,  builds  never  on  reason,  but  always  on  unreason. 
Reason  disowns  him,  scorns  him,  nay,  holds  him,  intellectually 
considered,  in  perfect  derision.  Poor  thing !  she  says,  he  has 
lost  his  wits  ;  send  him  to  the  lunatic  asylum. 

Having  established,  as  Count  de  Maistre  has  done,  that  all 
the  principles  of  our  religion  have  the  consensus  hominum^  we 
have  established  that  they  are  approved  by  reason.  We  must 
now  assume  that  they  are  principles  inherent  in  reason  itself,  im- 
mediately ascertainable  by  reason,  or  that  they  have  been  derived 
from  some  other  source.  If  we  say  either  of  the  former,  they 
are  authoritative  for  reason,  and  reason  must  assent  to  them  on 
the  peril  of  ceasing  to  be  reason.  If  we  say  they  are  not  inher- 
ent in  reason,  nor  immediately  ascertainable  by  reason,  we  must 
attribute  them — since  the  practical  reason  by  approving  pro- 
nounces them  pure,  sacred,  good — to  some  source  above  reason, 
that  is,  the  supernatural,  and  therefore  either  immediately  or 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  299 

mediately  to  God  himself.  Then  they  are  unquestionably  true, 
and  we  must  believe  them,  or  again  prove  ourselves  unreason- 
able ;  for  nothing  is  more  reasonable  than  to  believe  God,  and 
therefore  what  he  reveals.  So,  on  either  supposition,  we  must 
assent  to  them  or  deny  reason  itself  Consequently,  the  anal- 
ogies alleged  against  us  by  the  enemies  of  our  religion  fully 
establish  the  reasonableness  of  Christianity  in  principle,  and  that 
reason  must  assent  to  it  in  principle  or  abdicate  itself 

Yet  we  pretend  not  that  by  these  analogies  and  pagan  author- 
ities we  prove  the  absolute  truth  of  Christianity  as  a  positive 
revealed  religion.  We  simply  remove  all  objections  a  j^iriori 
which  can  be  conceived  against  it,  and  establish  the  reasonable- 
ness, the  truth,  for  the  practical  reason,  of  its  principles  ;  but  we 
leave  the  fact  of  Christianity  as  a  supernaturally  revealed  relig- 
ion to  be  proved  or  not  proved  by  the  testimony  in  the  case. 
The  argument  thus  far  shows  the  possible  truth  of  the  religion, 
the  actual  truth  for  the  reason  of  its  principles,  and  places  it  as 
a  positive  religion  in  the  category  of  facts  which  may  be  proved 
by  testimony.  If  the  actual  testimony  appropriate  in  the  case 
be  equal  to  what  satisfies  the  reason  in  the  case  of  ordinary  his- 
torical facts,  to  what  is  sufficient  in  the  ordinary  affairs  of  life  tx> 
render  assent  prudent,  it  is  proved  as  a  positive  revealed  relig- 
ion to  the  full  extent  that  reason  does  or  can  demand ;  and  he 
who  does  not  assent  and  act  accordingly  abdicates  his  title  to  be 
considered  a  reasonable  being.  The  appropriate  testimony  in 
the  case  is  unquestionably  equal  to  this, — is  all  that  reason, 
unless  it  ceases  to  be  reason,  requires  or  can  require.  Whoever, 
then,  witholds  his  assent  from  the  Christian  religion,  unless 
through  sheer  ignorance,  denies  reason.  True,  the  assent  thus 
yielded  or  warranted  is  only  the  assent  of  reason,  and  by  no 
means  the  assent  of  faith,  in  the  proper  Christian  sense ;  some- 
thing more  is  undoubtedly  demanded  for  faith ;  but  that,  what- 
ever it  be,  is  to  be  sought,  not  from  reason,  but  from  divine 
grace,  which  is  freely  given  to  all  who  do  not  voluntarily 
resist  it. 

The  Count's  method  of  argument,  properly  understood,  is 


300  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

therefore  ti'iumpliant  against  the  imbehever,  as  the  neologists 
themselves  have  pi'oved  over  and  over  again.  The  objection  of 
the  neoloo-ist  which  we  have  stated  is  met, — 1.  by  the  fact  that 
the  analogies  adduced  extend  to  the  principles,  not  to  the  posi- 
tive doctrinas,  of  Christianity  ;  and  consequently,  before  the  ne- 
ologists can  be  entitled  to  their  conclusion,  they  must  rebut  the 
positive  testimony  in  favor  of  Christianity  as  a  supernaturally 
revealed  religion,  and  also  prove  that  the  principles  without  the 
doctrines  are  sufficient,  neither  of  which  they  do  or  can  do  ;  and, 
2.  by  the  fact  that  the  principles  in  question,  between  which  and 
Christianity  there  is  the  relation  of  analogy  or  identity,  are  not 
themselves  originally  derived  from  simple  natural  reason,  or  from 
an  interior  subjective  revelation  made  immediately  to  each  man 
in  particular,  but  from  the  primitive  revelation  made  to  our  first 
parents,  and  preserved  and  diffused  by  tradition.  We,  as  well 
as  they,  find  Christian  elements  in  the  old  heathen  poets  and 
philosophers ;  and  perhaps  in  general  the  heathen  world,  under 
each  of  its  various  religions,  retained  more  of  Christian  princi- 
ple— we  say  not  of  Christian  doctrine — than  is  retained  by  our 
modern  sects.  Under  veils  and  symbols  more  or  less  transpar- 
ent, we  find  not  seldom,  not  only  Christian  principles,  but  a  very 
near  approach  to  some  one  or  more  of  the  Christian  Mysteries 
themselves.  Indeed,  the  type  after  which  all  religions  have 
been  fashioned  is  evidently  the  Christian  religion,  and  there  is 
scarcely  a  single  Christian  idea^  if  we  may  use  the  term,  which 
is  not  to  be  found  out  of  the  Christian  Church.  This,  however, 
presents  no  difficulty  to  the  Christian  ; — not,  indeed,  because  he 
supposes  all  has  been  derived  from  the  Holy  Scriptures  and  in- 
tercourse with  the  Jews,  as  some  have  thought, — though  more 
may  have  been  derived  from  this  source  than  many  in  our  days 
are  willing  to  acknowledge,  but  because  it  was  contained  in  the 
primitive  revelation  to  our  first  parents,  and  formed  the  common 
patrimony  of  the  race.  What  we  thus  find  is  revealed  truth, 
truth  pertaining  to  the  Christian  revelation,  pure  in  its  source, 
but  in  the  lapse  of  time  corrupted  and  mixed  up  with  fables  by 
the  nations,  as  they  multiplied  and  spread  themselves  over  the 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  301 

face  of  the  earth.  The  fountain  was  pure  and  supernatural,  but 
the  streams  which  flowed  from  it  became  gradually  corrupt  by 
receiving  waters  flowing  from  other  fountains.  Thus,  what  we 
find  in  consonance  with  our  religion  as  supernatural  we  attribute 
to  the  primitive  revelation  preserved  by  tradition ;  what  we  find 
repugnant  to  it  we  attribute  to  men  speaking  from  themselves, 
their  own  darkened  understandings  and  corrupt  hearts. 

The  Christian  revelation  is  not,  strictly  speaking,  a  new  rev- 
elation ;  Judaism  as  such,  though  a  divine  institution  for  a  spe- 
cial purpose,  was  not  a  dogmatic  revelation,  and  contained  no 
revealed  truths  not  contained  in  the  primitive  revelation.  The 
primitive  revelation  contained  in  substance  the  whole  Christian 
revelation,  and  the  only  difference  between  the  faith  of  the  Fath- 
ers from  the  beginning,  before  Christ,  and  that  of  the  Fathers 
since,  is,  that  those  before  believed  in  a  Christ  to  come,  and 
those  since  believe  in  a  Christ  that  has  come,  and  that  in  many 
thino-s  our  faith  is  clearer  and  more  explicit  than  was  theii-s. 
From  the  beginning  till  now,  the  revelation  believed  has  been 
ever  one  and  the  same  revelation,  the  faith  has  always  been  one 
and  the  same  faith.  Our  Lord  and  his  Apostles  introduced  no 
new  religion,  no  new  faith,  made  no  new  revelation,  except  to 
clear  up  and  render  more  explicit  what  had  been  revealed  and 
beheved  by  the  faithful  from  the  first.  It  is  not  the  true  view 
to  look  upon  our  Lord  as  coming  into  the  world  to  found  a  new 
relio-ion,  or  to  reveal  even  new  dogmas,  as  do  many  of  our  mod- 
ern sects.  He  came  to  make  the  Atonement,  to  perform  the 
work  of  redemption,  to  open  the  door  for  the  admission  of  the  just 
into  heaven,  and  to  establish  a  new  order,  the  order  of  grace  in 
place  of  the  Law,  that  we  might  have  life,  and  have  it  more 
abundantly. 

Due  consideration  of  this  fact  would  correct  the  errors  of  our 
Liberal  Christians,  and  enable  them  to  get  over  some  of  the  dif- 
ficulties they  now  find,  or  imagine  they  find.  They  read  the 
New  Testament,  and  find  in  it  no  creed  formally  drawn  out,  and 
therefore  conclude  that  none  is  enjoined  or  necessary.  They 
find  some  one  asking  what  he  shall  do  to  be  saved,  and  an  Apos- 


302  POLITICAL    CO^^STITUTIONS. 

tie  in  his  answer  requiring  bim  simply  to  believe  in  the  Lord 
Jesus  Christ,  and  therefore  they  conclude  only  the  simple  belief 
in  Jesus  as  the  Messiah,  whether  as  God,  as  a  superangelic 
being,  or  as  man  only,  it  matters  not,  is  all  the  faith  the  Gospel 
requires.  But  they  forget  that  they  to  whom  the  Apostle  so 
answers  are  supposed  to  be  already  instructed  in  the  faith,  and 
to  lack  nothing  of  the  true  Christian  faith,  but  to  believe  that 
the  Christ  that  was  to  come  has  come,  and  is  this  same  Jesus 
whom  they  crucified,  and  whom  God  has  raised  from  the  dead. 
The  simple  article  enjoined  was  all  the  addition  or  modification 
their  previous  faith  required.  But  to  conclude  from  this  that 
nothing  more  was  required  at  all  is  very  bad  logic. 

This  foct  attended  to  furnishes  us  one  of  the  reasons  why  the 
faith  is  always  assumed  or  presupposed  in  the  Holy  Scriptures, 
instead  of  being  distinctly  and  formally  taught.  The  sacred 
writers  always  address  themselves  to  believers,  to  persons  sup- 
posed to  have  already  received  the  faith,  and  therefore  not  in 
need  of  being  formally  and  systematically  taught  the  whole 
creed.  They  write,  not  to  propose  the  creed,  but  simply,  under 
the  relation  of  faith,  to  correct  the  errors  of  believers,  or  to  en- 
lighten them  on  some  particular  points  of  doctrine.  Nothing  is 
more  illogical  than  to  conclude,  from  the  absence  of  all  distinct 
and  formal  statement  from  their  pages  of  the  several  articles 
of  the  creed,  that  no  formal  creed  was  proposed,  believed,  or 
required. 

The  recognition  of  the  primitive  revelation  is  necessary,  also, 
to  account  for  the  sublime  truths  we  often  meet  with  in  ancient 
pagan  writers,  Oriental  and  Occidental,  in  juxtaposition  with 
mere  puerihties,  gross  absurdities,  and  abominations.  Any  one 
who  has  read  Plato  will  understand  what  we  mean.  There  are 
passages  in  this  writer  hardly  unworthy  of  a  Christian  Father, 
which  are  admirable  for  the  truth  and  sublimity  of  the  thought, 
for  their  lofty  religious  conception  and  pure  morality ;  and  there 
are  others  childishly  weak,  obviously  absurd,  and  grossly  impure, 
as,  for  instance,  some  passages  in  the  Banquet,  the  Timceus,  and 
the  Republic.     Take  Socrates  himself.     What  more  noble  than 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  303 

his  speech  on  his  trial  ?  He  speaks  of  God,  of  virtue,  and  im- 
mortahty  with  his  disciples,  while  awaiting  his  execution,  almost 
as  a  Christian,  and  more  worthily  than  many  who  call  themselves 
Christians  do  or  can  speak  ;  and  yet,  just  before  his  death,  he 
can  order  a  cock  to  be  sacrificed  to  ^sculapius.  Through  nearly 
all  heathen  antiquity  we  find  similar  phenomena  constantly  re- 
curring. How  explain  them  ?  The  mind  capable  of  producing 
from  its  own  resources  the  true,  the  pure,  the  sublime,  and  beau- 
tiful thoughts  and  sentiments  we  find,  could  never  have  produced 
or  tolerated  those  of  a  totally  different  character,  invariably 
mixed  up  with  them.  The  only  possible  explanation  is,  that  in 
the  former  they  spake  from  tradition,  from  the  sublime  wisdom 
of  the  ancients,  derived  from  a  primitive  revelation,  as  they 
themselves  always  acknowledge ;  just  as  the  only  explanation 
of  what  we  find  agreeable  to  the  purity,  truth,  and  sublimity  of 
the  Gospel  in  the  writings  and.  discourses  of  modern  heretics  is 
that  it  is  derived  not  from  their  heresy  or  their  own  minds,  but 
retained  from  the  Gospel  itselt^  is  the  reminiscence  of  the  true 
faith,  not  yet  wholly  lost  in  the  crude  mass  of  their  own  errors 
and  speculations. 

But  we  have  suflfered  ourselves  to  be  carried  too  far  away  by 
a  topic  only  incidental  to  our  present  purpose.  While  acknowl- 
edofino;  the  dano;er  to  which  Count  de  Maistre's  method  of  rea- 
soning  for  religion  against  an  unbelieving  and  scoffing  age  is 
exposed,  w^hen  not  duly  guarded,  we  have  wished,  in  passing, 
to  show  that  it  is  substantially  sound,  and  may  be  used  with 
great  propriety  and  eflfect.  The  influence  his  w^ritings  have  ex- 
erted on  France  are  a  proof  of  it.  When  he  firet  appeared, 
religion  was  out  of  fashion,  and  her  voice  failed  to  arrest  the 
attention  of  the  reading  f)ublic.  It  required  no  ordinary  de- 
gree of  moral  courage  at  that  time  to  avow  one's  self  a  Chris- 
tian, a  firm  believer  in  the  Church  of  God,  and  ready  to  do 
battle  for  the  faith.  For  more  than  half  a  century  the  whole 
literary  taste  had  been  perverted ;  the  philosophers  and  their 
follow^ers,  Voltaire  and  his  school,  reigned  supreme  in  the  world 
of  letters,  in  the  public  acts,  and  the  saloons  of  fashion.     But 


304  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

Count  de  Maistre  did  not  hesitate  to  raise  his  voice,  and,  sec- 
onded by  De  Lammenais,  not  yet  fallen,  and  by  the  Restoration 
and  its  friends,  he  succeeded,  by  the  grace  of  God,  in  bringing 
up  religion  once  more  to  men's  thoughts  and  affections,  and  of 
showing  to  faith  and  purity — what  is  never  to  be  doubted — that 
they  have  no  cause  to  blush  before  the  pretended  worshippers 
of  reason,  even  in  the  temple  of  reason  herself.  France  is  no 
longer  what  she  was.  The  French  works  best  known  and  most 
generally  read  by  the  people  of  this  country  are  the  groans, 
writhings,  and  contortions  of  a  party  in  its  agony.  They  pro- 
ceed not  from  the  mind  or  the  heart  of  the  real,  living,  progres- 
sive France  of  to-day.  Sans-culottism  in  religion,  morals,  or 
politics  is  not  at  present  precisely  a  Parisian  mode,  and  it  is  no 
longer  incompatible  with  good  taste  and  admission  into  good 
society  to  cover  one's  nakedness  with  the  robe  of  justice  and 
piety. 

Of  the  several  works  of  Count  de  Maistre,  there  is  no  one 
which,  at  the  present  moment,  could  be  circulated  or  read  with 
more  advantage  amongst  us,  than  the  one  now  before  us,  or 
better  fitted  to  the  actual  wants  of  our  politicians,  whether  Cath- 
olics or  Protestants ;  for,  unhappily,  a  very  considerable  portion 
of  our  Catholic  population  are  as  unsound  in  their  politics  as 
their  Protestant  neighbors.  Both  classes,  with  individual  ex- 
ceptions, have  borrowed  their  political  notions  from  the  school 
of  Hobbes,  Locke,  Jean  Jacques  Kousseau,  and  Thomas  Paine, 
and  forget,  or  have  a  strong  tendency  to  forget,  that  Divine 
Providence  has  something  to  do  with  forming,  preserving, 
amending,  or  overthrowing  the  constitutions  of  states.  We  say 
nothing  new,  when  we  say  that  modern  politics  are  in  principle, 
and  generally  in  practice,  purely  atheistic.  Even  large  numbers, 
who  in  rel-igion  are  sound  orthodox  believers,  and  would  suffer 
a  thousand  deaths  sooner  than  knowingly  swerve  one  iota  from 
the  faith,  may  be  found,  who  do  not  hesitate  to  vote  God  out 
of  the  political  constitution,  and  to  advocate  liberty  on  principles 
which  logically  put  man  in  the  place  of  God.  It  is  to  such  as 
these  the  little  work  before  us  is  addressed,  and  they  cannot 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  305 

study  it  without  perceiving  the  capital  mistake  they  have  made 
— not  in  seeking  pohtical  freedom,  but  in  seeking  to  base  it  on 
atheistical  principles.  The  man  who  advocates  political  hberty 
on  Protestant  principles  can  stop  short  of  atheism  only  at  the 
expense  of  his  logic. 

Count  de  Maistre  is  no  doubt  a  stanch  monarchist,  and  holds 
hereditary  monarchy,  tempered  by  a  due  admixture  of  aristocracy 
and  democracy,  to  be  the  best  of  all  possible  form.s  of  govern- 
ment ;  but  it  is  not  for  this  we  commend  him,  for  this  is  by  no 
means  a  necessary  conclusion  from  the  great  generative  principle 
of  political  constitutions  he  insists  upon.     That  principle  we  may 
accept  without  any  disposition  to  be  monarchists,  for  it  is  as 
true  and  as  apphcable  in  the  case  of  a  repubhcan  constitution 
as  in  that  of  a  monarchical  constitution.     Where  the  existing 
legitimate  order  is  monarchical,  it  undoubtedly  requires  us  to 
support  monarchy,  and  forbids  us  to  seek  to  substitute  another 
order  in  its  place ;  but,  for  the  same  reason,  where  the  existing 
legitimate  order  is  the  republican,  it  requires  us  to  support  re- 
publicanism, and  forbids  us  to  seek  to  introduce  monarchy.     In 
this  country  the  existing  legal  order  is  repubhcan,  and  the  prin- 
ciple the  Count  insists  upon  commands  us,  whatever  may  or 
may  not  be  our  private  convictions  as  to  the  best  form  of  gov- 
ernment m  se,  to  support  it,  and  to  resist  with  our  lives  every 
attempt  to  subvert  it.     It  may  or  may  not  be,  we  may  or  we 
may  not  believe  it,  the  best  of  all  possible  forms  of  governmeni 
in  the  abstract ;  but  that  has  nothing  to  do  with  the  question. 
It  is  the  form  which  God  in  his  providence  has  established  here, 
and  therefore  it  is  the  best  for  us  ;  it  is  the  law,  and  therefore 
we  must  obey  it,  and  cannot  resist  it  without  resisting  God, 
from  whom  is  all  power,  by  whom  kings  reign  and  legislators 
decree  just  things. 

There  are  two  grounds  on  which  we  may  seek  support  for  our 
republican  institutions  ;— the  one,  opinion  ;  the  other,  conscience ; 
— that  is,  either  because  we  believe  them  the  best  in  se,  or  be- 
cause they  are  the  law.  Our  modern  politicians,  who  uniformly 
mistake  falsehood  for  truth,  and  substitute  the  feebler  for  the 


306  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

stronger,  the  worse  for  the  better  reason,  as  a  matter  of  course 
place  all  their  reliance  on  the  former,  and  regard  those  who  pre- 
fer the  latter  as  the  enemies  of  our  free  institutions.  But  noth- 
ing is  more  fluctuating,  precarious,  or  uncertain  than  opinion. 
The  multitude  may  be  of  one  opinion  to-day,  and  of  another  to- 
morrow. To-day  they  may  hurrah  for  democracy ;  to-morrow 
they  may  throw  up  their  caps  for  some  military  hero,  and  cry, 
Long  live  the  king!  To  rely  on  mere  opinion  is  to  lean  on  a 
broken  reed.  The  opinion  may  change,  and  the  moment  it  does, 
we  have  no  reason,  if  it  has  been  our  reliance,  to  urge  for  sustain- 
ing the  present  order,  or  why  the  people  should  not  subvert  it, 
and  substitute  some  other  order;  and  we  may  be  sure  the  opin- 
ion will  change,  whenever  the  present  order  proves,  or  attempts 
to  prove,  itself  a  government  by  restraining  popular  passion  and 
caprice,  or  anything  more  than  a  by-law  of  a  voluntary  associ- 
ation ; — 

"  For  no  man  ever  feels  the  halter  draw 
But  with  a  nmean  opinion  of  the  law." 

But  if  we  place  their  support  on  the  ground  that  they  are  the 
legal  order,  the  law,  we  make  our  appeal,  not  to  opinion,  but  to 
conscience.  Conscience  uniformly  and  invariably  commands  us 
to  obey  the  law,  but  does  not  command  us  always  to  obey  opin- 
ion. Opinions  may  vary  as  to  what  is  the  law ;  but  when  this 
or  that  is  decided  to  be  law,  conscience,  which  is  not  opinion, 
without  any  variation  or  the  least  hesitation,  commands  us  to 
submit  to  it,  and  all  who  regard  at  all  the  voice  of  conscience  do 
so.  When  we  place  the  obligation  to  support  our  institutions 
on  the  notion  we  may  have  that  they  are  the  best,  we  give  them 
only  an  intellectual  basis,  and  can  enlist  only  the  intellect  in 
their  behalf;  but  when  we  demand  obedience  to  them  on  the 
ground  that  they  are  the  law,  we  base  them  on  morality,  and 
place  them  under  the  protection  of  religion.  We  demand  then 
obedience  as  a  duty,  not  merely  as  a  sound  judgment,  and 
make  loyalty  not  merely  a  sentiment,  but  a  virtue.  It  was  only 
the  foliy  or  delusion  of  the  last  century  that  could,  for  a  mo- 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  30*7 

ment,  have  hesitated  between  conscience  and  opinion,  or  even 
pretended  to  doubt  which  is  the  more  reasonable  and  sohd  basis 
of  government. 

We  suspect,  however,  that  our  pohticians  will  continue  to  pre- 
fer opinion  to  conscience ;  for  it  is  not  the  preservation  of  our 
institutions,  but  the  facility  of  changing  them,  that  they  wish  to 
secure.  It  is  not  government  they  want,  but  the  liberty  to  make 
the  government  any  thing  they  please ;  or  if  they  ask  for 
government,  it  is  not  that  it  may  govern  them,  but  that  they 
may  govern  it.  They  want,  not  a  fixed  and  permanent  order, 
but  a  loose  and  flexible  order,  yielding  without  the  least  resist- 
ance to  their  passions,  caprices,  or  supposed  interests.  They  re- 
gard, and  for  this  reason  will  continue  to  regard,  all  those  who 
would  make  our  institutions  sacred,  place  them  under  the  pro- 
tection of  religion  and  morals,  and  support  them  on  the  ground 
that  they  are  the  law,  and  that  the  law  must  be  obeyed,  as  the 
enemies  of  the  people,  and  to  be  denounced  as  anti-republican 
and  anti-American.  Tliey  are  willing  to  appeal  to  opinion  and 
sentiment,  but  they  cannot  endure  that  we  should  appeal  to  re- 
ligion and  morals,  to  conscience,  or  the  sense  of  duty.  For  on 
the  former  ground  there  is  liberty  to  change,  modify,  subvert,  at 
will ;  but  on  the  latter  there  is  a  strict  obligation  to  preserve  the 
institutions  as  they  are,  and  to  resist  unto  death  every  one  who 
would  seek  to  subvert  them.  It  is  not  monarchy  or  aristocracy 
against  which  the  modern  spirit  fights,  but  against  loyalty ; 
what  it  hates  is  not  this  or  that  form  of  government,  but  legiti- 
macy^ and  it  would  rebel  against  democracy  as  quick  as  against 
absolute  monarchy,  if  democracy  were  asserted  on  the  ground 
of  legitimacy. 

The  modern  spirit  is  in  every  thing  the  direct  denial  of  the 
practical  reason.  It  reverses  every  thing  which  has  received 
the  sanction  of  the  race.  In  former  times,  it  was  universally 
held  that  authority  was  a  good,  indeed  a  necessity,  and  in  all 
things  men  sought  for  an  authority,  something  which  could  and 
had  the  right  to  command.  They  inquired  always  for  the  law, 
and  law  was  always  held  to  be  imperative.     Religion  was  the 


308  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

highest  law,  and  authoritative,  and  no  individual  or  nation  had  a 
right  to  dispute  its  dominion  ;  morals  were  binding,  were  the 
law  imposed  by  religion  ;  politics  were  referred  to  the  sovereign 
authority,  to  the  majesty  of  the  prince,  or  the  state.  The  great- 
est evil  conceivable  was  supposed  to  be  that  of  being  without 
law,  without  religious,  moral,  and  political  authority  having  the 
right  to  exact  and  the  ability  to  secure  submission.  Man's  glory, 
according  to  the  ancient  spirit,  was  in  obedience  to  law.  But 
the  modern  spirit  reverses  all  this.  It  seeks  not  the  authority 
which  men  are  bound  to  obey,  and  to  induce  them  to  obey  it, 
but  it  claims  for  man  himself  the  authority  in  all  things  to  make 
the  law.  It  asserts  the  universal  and  absolute  supremacy  of 
man,  and  his  unrestricted  right  to  subject  religion,  morals,  and 
pohtics  to  his  own  will,  passion,  or  caprice.  There  is  no  denying 
this.  Its  direct  aim  and  tendency  is  to  place  the  subject  over 
the  sovereign,  and  to  give  to  the  subject  in  religion,  morals,  or 
politics  the  right  to  put  a  rope  round  his  sovereign's  neck,  as 
the  Chinese  sometimes  do  around  the  neck  of  their  idol,  and 
drag  liiui  from  his  throne,  and  through  the  streets,  and  apply 
the  Itamboo  whenever  he  chances  not  to  conform  himself  to  their 
will  and  pleasure.  It  calls  government  government,  because  it 
is  not  government  ;  morals  morals,  because  they  are  not  morals, 
that  is,  not  obligatory  upon  the  will ;  religion  religion,  because  it 
is  not  religion,  that  is,  does  not  bind  man  to  God ;  law  law,  be- 
cause it  is  not  law ;  and  reason  reason,  because  it  is  7iot  reason. 
Marvellous  is  the  age  we  live  in  !  Marvellous  the  light  and 
progress  of  the  modern  world !  AVe  have  extinguished  the  light 
of  reason,  and  therefore  are  reasonable  ;  reduced  wisdom  to 
folly,  and  therefore  are  wise ;  substituted  nonsense  for  sense, 
and  therefore  are  intelligent,  and  have  the  right  to  call  all  who 
went  before  us  fools  and  madmen,  which  assuredly  they  were, — 
unless  we  are. 

The  political  mania  of  the  last  century,  and  a  mania  not  yet 
much  abated,  was  that  a  political  constitution  may  be  written 
and  clapped  into  one's  pocket.  Men  not  in  a  lunatic  hospital, 
men  who  were  regarded  by  their  contemjioraries  as  great  men, 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  309 

learned  men,  profound  philosophers  and  statesmen,  in  open  day, 
in  elaborate  treatises,  in  grave  deliberative  assemblies,  actually 
contended  that  the  political  constitution  is  a  thing  which  may 
be  made  as  one  makes  a  handcart  or  a  wheelbarrow,  or  drawn 
up  beforehand  as  one  draws  up  a  note  of  hand ;  and,  what  is 
stranger  still,  they  were  believed,  and  whole  nations  thrilled  at 
the  wonderful  discovery,  and,  leaving  all  other  business,  engaged 
heart  and  soul,  might  and  main,  in  the  manufacture  and  sale  of 
constitutions.  We  ourselves  opened  a  shop  for  the  business,  or 
pretended  to  do  so  ;  but  France  opened  an  establishment  on  a 
much  larger  scale,  and  carried  on  the  business  to  an  extent 
which  differed  only  a  step  from  the  sublime.  The  facility  and 
rapidity  with  which  the  lively  French,  for  a  series  of  years,  turn- 
ed out  ready-made  constitutions,  for  home  consumption  and  ex- 
portation, can  be  compared  to  nothing  better  than  to  the  facility 
with  which  a  Connecticut  Yankee  turns  out  wooden  clocks, 
wooden  bowls,  wooden  nutmegs,  cut-nails,  clothes-pins,  or  loco- 
foco  matches.  The  delusion  was  all  but  univei-sal  for  a  time, 
and  can  be  accounted  for  not  without  attributing  it  in  part  to 
demoniacal  agency.  Men  not  drawn  down  below  the  rank  of 
their  own  nature,  not  made  worse  than  human  in  their  passions, 
and  less  than  human  in  their  reason  and  understanding,  could 
never  have  been  so  wildly  and  madly  carried  away. 

In  the  work  before  us,  Count  de  Maistre  attacks  with  all  his 
erudition,  philosophy,  experience,  and  wit,  this  terrible  delusion, 
— a  delusion  which  even  Carlyle  has  mercilessly  ridiculed,  and 
against  which,  our  readers  will  bear  us  witness,  we  ourselves 
have  argued  and  declaimed  with  all  our  might,  ever  since  we 
began  to  address  the  public  on  political  subjects.  De  Maistre 
shows,  beyond  the  possibility  of  doubt  or  cavil^  that  the  political 
constitution  of  a  state  is  not  and  cannot  be  made  ;  that  what- 
ever it  is,  whatever  its  form,  if  it  be  a  constitution  at  all,  it  is 
generated,  not  made ;  that  it  grows  up  by  Divine  Providence, 
and  is  never  framed  beforehand,  drawn  up  deliberately,  and  put 
into  operation  by  those  who  live  or  are  to  live  under  it.  It  is 
never  the  work  of  deliberation,  but  always  the  work  of  Divine 


glO  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

Providence,  using  men  and  circumstances  as  his  instruments. 
It  is  always  immediately  or  mediately — mediately  in  all  cases, 
perhaps,  except  one — imposed  by  God  himself,  is  the  expi-ession 
of  the  Divine  will,  and  therefore  legitimate,  sacred,  and  suited  to 
the  nation.  This  is  the  leading  principle  of  the  Essay  before  us. 
The  generative  pr  nciple  of  all  political  constitutions  which  are 
such  is  Divine  Pi  Dvidence,  never  the  deliberate  wisdom  or  will 
of  men. 

This  doctrine  is  unquestionably  conservative  ;  for  it  makes  the 
constitution  sacred.  It  is  monarchical,  where  monarchy  is  the 
constitution  of  the  state ;  it  is  also  republican,  where,  as  with  us, 
the  constitution  is  republican.  It  would  forbid  the  subjects  of  a 
monarchy  to  throw  off  monarchy  and  attempt  to  create  a  repub- 
lic ;  it  would  also  forbid  the  citizens  of  a  republic  to  throw  off 
republicanism  and  attempt  to  found  a  monarchy.  If  we  are  de- 
structives or  revolutionists  on  principle,  and  are  resolved  to  be 
always  able  to  govern  the  government  when  we  please  and  as 
we  please,  this  doctrine  must  offend  us,  and  we  cannot  but  resist 
it;  but  if  we  are  attached  to  our  institutions,  hold  our  constitution 
to  be  law,  not  a  mere  regulation,  and  wish  to  preserve  it,  this  is 
the  very  doctrine  we  need,  and  must  heartily  embrace.  For  our 
own  part,  we  hold  the  republican  constitution  of  this  country  to 
be  the  Icijitimate  order,  and  ourselves  bound  in  conscience  to 
submit  to  it,  whether  we  believe  it  the  best  possible  form  of  gov- 
ernment for  every  people  on  earth  or  not.  It  is  the  best  pos- 
sible FORM  FOR  us.  We  wisli  to  preserve  it  intact,  in  all  its 
life  and  vigor,  and  therefore  we  wish  to  see  the  doctrine  in  ques- 
tion embraced  and  cherished  by  every  American  citizen. 

But  when  we  speak  of  the  American  constitution,  our  readers 
must  not  imagine  that  we  mean  the  written  instrument  usually 
denominated  the  constitution.  The  written  constitution  may 
sometimes  be  a  memorandum  of  the  real  constitution,  but  is 
never  that  constitution  itself;  and  it  is  always  a  mere  cobweb, 
save  so  hv  as  it  is  also  written  on  the  hearts,  and  in  the  habits, 
the  manners  and  customs  of  the  people,  as  our  own  daily  expe- 
rience abundantly  proves.     The  constitution  is  the  living  soul 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  311 

of  the  nation,  that  by  virtue  of  which  it  is  a  nation,  and  is  able 
to  hve  a  national  hfe,  and  perform  national  functions.  You  can 
no  more  write  it  out  on  parchment,  and  put  it  into  your  pocket, 
than  you  can  the  soul  of  man.  It  is  no  dead  letter,  which  when 
interrogated  is  silent,  and  when  attacked  is  impotent;  it  is  a 
living  spirit,  a  living  power,  a  living  providence,  and  resides 
wherever  the  nation  is,  and  expresses  itself  in  every  national  act. 
Written  constitutions  are  never "  resorted  to,  when  the  real  con- 
stitution is  in  full  vitality  and  vigor,  and  the  state  performs  freely 
its  normal  functions ;  and  the  most  beautiful  period  in  the  his- 
tory of  every  nation  is  the  period  prior  to  the  attempt  to  reduce 
its  constitution  and  laws  to  writing.  The  written  instrument  is 
invariably  a  proof  that  the  constitution  has  sufiered  violence, 
has  been  enfeebled,  and  its  existence  endangered.  It  is  resorted 
to  as  a  means  of  preservation,  in  the  hope  that  by  writing  it  the 
constitution  may  be  strengthened,  and  further  encroachment 
prevented.  But  when  it  is  in  its  full  vigor,  and  has  suffered  no 
violence,  men  no  more  think  of  writing  it,  than  the  housewife 
thinks  each  morning  of  reducing  to  writing  her  arrangements 
for  her  household  during  the  day. 

The  people  of  this  country  have  not  made,  and  could  not 
make,  our  political  constitution.  It  was  imposed  by  a  compe- 
tent authority,  and  has  grown  to  be  what  it  is,  through  the  pro- 
vidence of  God.  The  people  have  never  had  the  control  of  it. 
It  was  not  their  foresight,  wisdom,  convictions,  or  will,  that  made 
it  republican.  The  constitution  was  repubhcan  from  the  first, 
and  we  established  no  monarchy  or  nobility  at  the  close  of  the 
war  of  Independence,  for  the  simple  reason  that  neither  was  in 
our  constitution.  The  royalty  and  nobihty  we  knew  prior  to  In- 
dependence were  English,  not  American.  Mr.  Bancroft  has  well 
remarked,  in  his  history  of  the  Colonization  of  the  United  States, 
that  royalty  and  nobility  did  not  emigrate.  Since  they  did  not 
emigrate,  they  remained  at  home,  and  were  not  here ;  not  being 
here,  they  were  not  in  our  political  constitution.  The  commons 
alone  emigrated,  and  consequently  our  constitution  recognized 
only  commons.     When,  therefore,  the   foreign   authority   was 


312  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

thrown  off,  and  we  were  left  to  our  own  constitution,  we  had 
only  the  government  of  the  commons,  that  is  to  say,  the  repre- 
sentative democracy,  or  the  elective  aristocracy,  if  we  may  use 
the  term,  which  we  brought  here  from  the  mother  country. 
Our  government  is  simply  the  British  House  of  Commons,  with- 
out the  king  and  House  of  Lords,  divided  for  the  sake  of  con- 
venience into  an  upper  and  loAver  chamber,  and  with  such  few 
changes  and  modifications  as  were  necessary  to  provide  for  an 
executive  authority.  The  constitution  was  determined  for  us  by 
the  providence  of  God,  which  so  ordered  it  that  only  the  com- 
mons emigrated,  and  so  created  and  airanged  circumstances  as 
to  compel  us  from  sheer  necessity  to  live  under  a  government 
from  which  royalty  and  nobility  are  excluded. 

Count  de  Maistre  not  only  contends  that  the  constitution  is 
never  made,  or  drawn  up  by  the  people  with  deliberation  and 
forethought,  that  it  is  always  the  work  of  Providence  using  men 
and  circumstances  to  eflfect  or  express  his  will,  but  that  it  can 
never  be  essentially  changed  by  the  people  or  the  nation,  delib- 
erately or  otherwise,  without  the  destruction  of  the  nation  itself. 
If  God  determines  and  fixes  the  political  constitution  of  a  peo- 
ple, it  follows  that  the  constitution  exists  by  the  divine  will  and 
authority  ;  to  seek  to  subvert  or  essentially  change  it  is,  then,  to 
war  against  God,  and  we  need  not  labor  to  prove  that  no  indi- 
vidual or  nation  can  ever  rebel  against  God  with  success  or  im- 
punity. Nations  and  individuals  who  conspire  against  God,  and 
seek  to  make  their  will  prevail  instead  of  his,  are  sure  to  be  de- 
stroyed. They  separate  themselves  from  the  source  of  life,  from 
the  fountain  of  strength,  and  can  but  wither  and  die,  as  the 
branch  severed  from  the  vine. 

This  conclusion,  which  we  know  by  infallible  faith  to  be  true, 
is,  moreover,  verified  by  all  history.  Our  wise  politicians  seek 
a  thousand  reasons  to  explain  the  diflferent  results  which  nation- 
al independence  has  produced  here,  from  those  which  it  has  pro- 
duced in  Spanish  America.  There  can  be  no  question  that  in 
every  one  of  the  Spanish  x\merican  states  republicanism  has 
proved  a  complete  failure ;  yet  with  us  it  is  thought  to  have 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  313 

succeeded.  Whence  the  difference  ?  It  is  idle  to  look  fc  v  the 
cause  in  the  superiority  of  the  Anglo-Saxon  over  the  Spanish 
race,  for  this  superiority  is  perfectly  imaginary ;  and  the  Span- 
ish American  colonies,  as  colonies,  wei-e  in  real  prosperity  and 
genuine  civilization  in  advance  of  the  Anglo-xAmerican.  The 
diflference  of  religion,  too,  has  been  immensely  in  favor  of  Span- 
ish America ;  because,  while  Protestantism  tends  to  render  men 
disorderly,  insubordinate,  impatient  of  restraint,  and  indifferent 
-to  the  sacred  obligations  of  law.  Catholicity  generates  habits  of 
order,  subordination,  and  reverence  for  law.  Yet  the  attempt 
to  establish  republicanism  in  Spanish  America  has  resulted  very 
nearly  in  the  dissolution  of  all  society.  The  cause  of  the  dif- 
ference is  in  the  fact  that  republicanism  with  us  was  from  the 
first  the  constitution,  but  was  never  the  constitution  of  the  Span- 
ish American  colonies.  In  them  royalty  and  nobility  settled ; 
and  the  whole  constitution  of  the  mother  country,  not  merely 
that  of  the  commons,  was  transferred  to  the  New  World.  Roy- 
alty and  nobility  were  integral  elements  in  their  constitution 
fi'om  the  outset.  We  in  declaring  independence  made  no  revo- 
lution in  the  government ;  we  only  threw  off  what  was  foreign, 
while  we  retained  all  that  was  indigenous,  and  the  removal  of 
the  foreign  or  English  authority  only  enabled  the  indigenous  to 
manifest  and  exert  itself  in  open  day,  in  full  and  unimpeded 
life  and  vigor.  But  in  Spanish  America  independence  was  not 
merely  throwing  off  the  foreign  element,  the  authority  of  the 
mother  country,  but  was  a  revolution,  a  subversion  of  the  exist- 
ing constitution,  and  the  attempt  to  establish  a  new  and  a 
totally  different  political  order.  The  cause  of  the  failure  is  pre- 
cisely in  this  attempt  to  change  essentially  the  political  constitu- 
tion. If  Spanish  America  had  simply  declared  herself  inde- 
pendent of  Old  Spain,  but  retained  intact  her  domestic  constitu- 
tion, there  can  be  no  reason  to  doubt  that  her  prosperity  would, 
at  least,  have  kept  pace  with  ours.  Portuguese  America,  Bra- 
zil, has  succeeded  the  best,  after  us,  of  all  the  American  States, 
for  she  did  not  essentially  change  her  original  constitution. 
We  can  easily  suppose  what  would  have  been  our  success,  if 


314  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

we  had  attempted  to  introduce  and  establisli  monarchy  and  no- 
bility. There  were  among  us  distinguished  men — the  most  dis- 
tinguished, perhaps,  and  firm  patriots,  too — who  had  no  con- 
fidence in  repubhcanism,  and  were  pretty  well  persuaded  that  a 
government  without  king  and  nobles  must  prove  a  failure.  But 
we  had  no  royalty  and  nobility.  Neither  was  here,  and  neither 
could  be  introduced  without  a  social  revolution.  Suppose  we 
had  attempted  to  introduce  them,  to  constitute  the  three  estates, 
and  retain  the  whole  constitution  of  the  mother  country ;  who 
can  doubt  that  the  result  would  have  been  similar  to  what  has 
been  in  Spanish  America  the  attempt  to  introduce  republican- 
ism ?  Neither  being  in  the  constitution,  both  would  have  been 
resisted  by  the  whole  force  of  American  society,  and  could  have 
triumphed  only  by  overcoming  that  force,  and  destroying  the 
whole  existing  social  order,  that  is,  the  state  itself. 

France  sought  to  change  from  a  monarchy  to  a  republic.  She 
was  great,  powerful,  intellectual,  and  cnthusiai^tic.  Never  could 
the  attempt  have  been  made  under  more  favorable  auspices. 
She  was  aided,  or  not  im])edecl,  in  the  outset,  by  the  very  orders 
in  the  state  which  had  the  greatest  privileges  to  lose ;  the  sur- 
rounding nations,  the  whole  world  sympathized  with  her,  and 
a})plauded  lier  movement ;  and  yet  her  failure  was  striking,  and 
no  man  can  doubt,  if  he  has  ordinary  judgment,  that,  if  she 
had  not  returned  to  her  old  constitution,  or  in  part  returned, 
she  would  ere  this  have  been  blotted  out  from  the  chart  of 
Europe  as  an  independent  nation.  Her  present  uneasiness,  her 
present  unsettled  and  ominous  state,  and  all  the  difficulties  she 
lias  to  encounter  grow  out  of  her  return  having  been  partial,  in- 
stead of  complete.  The  most  glorious  period  of  French  history 
since  the  reign  of  Louis  the  Fourteenth,  perhaps  since  St.  Louis, 
is  that  of  Charles  the  Tenth, — a  man  and  a  })rince  to  whom 
history  is  not  likely  to  do  justice.  The  Bourbons  committed 
great  faults,  and  they  deserved,  and  drew  down  upon  their 
guilty  heads  the  vengeance  of  Almighty  God  ;  but  if  the  fam- 
ily had,  before  the  breaking  out  of  the  Revolution,  or  in  its 
first  stages,  listened  to  the  Count  d'Artois,  or  if  France  had 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  315 

been  wise  enough  to  understand  his  character  and  appreciate 
the  firmness  of  his  principles  when  he  became  Charles  the 
Tenth,  she  would  now  have  been  in  the  possession  of  her  an- 
cient constitution  and  of  all  her  ancient  glory.  There  would 
have  been  no  "  glorious  three  days,"  no  i:)ro(jramme  de  Hotel 
de  Ville,  no  such  anomaly  as  a  "citizen  king," — a  king  by 
virtue  of  the  Bourse,  it  is  true,  but  only  so  much  the  better. 
The  same  impossibility  of  changing  the  constitution  without 
destroying  social  order  we  see  in  the  recent  history  of  Spain 
and  Portugal.  Each  of  these  kingdoms,  Spain  especially,  play- 
ed at  no  distant  date  a  distinguished  part  among  the  kingdoms 
of  Europe ;  but  both  are  now  fallen  so  low  that  there  are  few 
so  poor  as  to  do  them  reverence.  It  is  not  difficult  to  trace 
their  present  degradation,  we  say  not  to  efforts  at  social  amelior- 
ation, but  to  efforts  to  ameliorate  their  social  condition  by  or- 
ganic changes,  or  fundamental  changes  in  the  political  consti- 
tution of  the  state,  that  is,  to  revolutionism,  and  they  must 
return  substantially  to  their  old  national  constitutions,  lapse  into 
anarchy  and  barbarism,  or  be  absorbed  by  their  more  powerful 
neighbors. 

We  have  found  in  our  historical  reading  no  instance  of  a 
fundamental  change  of  the  national  constitution  that  was  suc- 
cessful. Never  does  a  republic  become  a  monarchy,  or  a  mon- 
archy a  republic,  without  the  virtual  destruction  of  the  state. 
Athens  was  originally  monarchical,  tempered,  we  suspect,  by  both 
aristocracy  and  democracy.  The  democratic  element  finally 
gained  the  mastery ;  but  it  retained  the  ascendency  for  only  one 
hundred  and  four  years.  Solon  himself  saw  the  Pisistratid£e, 
and  the  whole  period  was  one  of  political  turmoil,  of  change, 
and  usurpation,  and  the  government  was  almost  always  in  the 
hands  of  a  single  chief,  who  ruled,  with  or  without  law,  during 
his  ascendency,  very  much  as  he  pleased.  The  smaller  Grecian 
cities,  which  adopted  the  republican  order  with  scarcely  an  ex- 
ception, in  brief  space,  fell  under  the  rule  of  tyrants  or  usurpers. 
We  make  no  account  of  Rome,  because  her  constitution  was 
originally  patrician,  a  modification  of  the   patriarchal,  an  '  the 


316  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

royal  authority  acted  not  really  on  the  people,  but  simply  on  the 
patrician,  or  head  of  the  gens.  The  abolition  of  the  royal  and 
the  substitution  of  the  consulai-  authority  were  no  fundamental 
change  in  the  constitution;  nor  was  the  estabhshment,  at  a 
later  period,  of  the  tribunitial  veto  ;  for  the  positive  power  of 
the  state  continued  where  it  had  been  placed  by  Romulus,  in  the 
patrician  body.  The  change  to  the  imperial  government  was 
perhaps  more  fundamental,  and  makes  decidedly  for  the  doctrine 
we  maintain  ;  for  just  in  proportion  as  the  constitution  was 
changed  under  the  emperors,  and  they  usurped  the  functions  of 
the  Senate,  Rome  declined,  and  continued  to  decline,  till  it  was 
no  more. 

In  feet,  if  we  may  credit  at  all  the  lessons  of  history,  the 
change  of  the  original  constitution  of  a  state,  if  fundamental 
and  permanent,  is  always  and  inevitably  the  destruction  of  the 
state  itself.  It  is  as  easy  to  extract  the  soul  from  the  body,  and 
give  to  the  body  another  soul,  without  causing  death,  as  to  take 
from  a  state  its  original  constitution  and  give  it  a  new  one,  and 
still  retain  the  life  of  the  nation.  If  the  original  constitution 
has  died  out,  the  nation  is  dead,  and  you  can  no  more  give  it  a 
new  constitution  and  restore  it  to  life,  than  you  can  give  to  a 
dead  body  a  new  soul,  and  render  it  once  more  a  living  body. 
The  new  constitution  must  come  in  with  a  new  people,  which 
subjects  and  takes  the  place  of  the  old,  as  is  clearly  evinced  in 
the  case  of  the  downfall  of  the  old  Roman  empire,  and  the  rise 
of  the  modern  states  of  Europe.  Even  religion  herself  cannot 
prevent  it ;  she  may  delay  the  catastrophe,  but  she  has  no  power 
to  avert  it.  Constantine.  Theodosius,  Justinian,  cannot  pre- 
vent the  doom  of  Rome,  old  or  new.  The  Northern  barbarian 
executes  it  upon  the  one,  the  Turk  upon  the  other.  The  vast 
populations  of  Asia  have  no  indigenous  power  to  rise  from 
their  degradation,  and  they  will  be  restored  never,  unless  con- 
quered and  subjected  by  a  people  already  living,  already  in  pos- 
session of  a  constitution  in  its  life  and  vigor,  because  their  old 
political  constitutions  are  effete,  and  they  now  subsist  as  popu- 
lations rather  than  as  states. 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS.  317 

God,  by  giving  in  his  providence  a  particular  constitution  to 
a  particular  j^eople,  has  fixed  its  law,  the  law  of  its  life,  its  pros- 
perity, and  its  duration.  No  people  survives  its  constitution. 
The  overthrow  of  our  republican  constitution  would  be  our  po- 
litical death.  Spanish  x\merica,  if  it  does  not  reestablish  its 
original  monarchical  and  aristocratic  order,  must  either  lapse  into 
complete  barbarism,  or  be  absorbed  by  us.  The  Canadas  have 
foolishly  attempted  once,  perhaps  may  attempt  again,  independ- 
ence of  the  mother  country,  in  view  of  establishing  the  republi- 
can regime  ;  they  have  thus  far  failed,  for  they  have  royalty  and 
DobiHty  in  their  constitution.  If  Lower  Canada  had  not  had, 
she  would,  in  what  we  call  our  Revolution,  have  made  common 
cause  with  us,  gained  her  independence,  and  become  a  member 
of  our  confederacy.  Some  Young  Irelanders  appear  to  us  also 
to  dream  of  repubhcanism  or  democracy  for  Ireland.  They 
could  not  be  madder.  The  constitution  of  Ireland  is  not,  never 
was,  and  never  can  be,  republican.  Royalty  and  nobility  are 
essential  elements  of  it. 

But  let  no  one  be  so  silly  as  to  imagine  that  the  conservative 
principle  contended  for  by  Count  de  Maistre  is  hostile  to  such 
social  meliorations  and  such  administrative  changes  as  time  and 
its  vicissitudes  may  render  necessary  or  expedient.  But  the 
true  social  reformer  is  the  state  physician,  and  proceeds  in  regard 
to  the  state  precisely  as  the  medical  doctor  does  in  regard  to  the 
human  body.  He  seeks  always  to  heal  the  disorders  of  the  state 
without  destroying  or  impairing  the  constitution,  and  by  the 
application  of  such  remedies  as  are  peculiarly  adapted  to  the 
constitution.  If  the  constitution  is  already  broken  up  and  be- 
come incurable,  he  knows  there  is  no  effectual  remedy,  and  that 
complete  dissolution,  sooner  or  later,  must  inevitably  ensue. 
But  if  he  finds  the  constitution  still  sound  at  bottom,  he  seeks 
simply  to  restore  it  to  its  normal  state,  and  to  guard  against 
whatever  would  tend  to  impair*  its  healthy  and  vigorous  action. 
In  other  words,  he  restores,  but  does  not  seek  to  create ;  devel- 
ops, but  does  not  attempt  to  institute. 

On  this  principle  we  see  our  present  Holy  Father  introducing 


318  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

administrative  changes  in  the  temporal  government  of  the  States 
of  the  Church.  How  far  the  reforms  he  has  introduced  or  pro- 
posed extend,  we  are  not  able  to  say ;  and  how  far  they  will 
effect  the  end  intended,  and  serve  to  tranquillize  the  turbulent 
spii-its,  the  unprincipled  and  ambitious,  among  his  subjects,  it  is 
not  for  us  to  judge,  or  even  to  inquire.  But  we  can  easily  be- 
lieve that  in  an  old  government,  hke  that  of  the  Roman  States, 
some  administrative  abuses  may  with  the  lapse  of  time  have 
cre[>t  in,  and  that  the  alterations  which  for  the  last  hundred  years 
have  been  taking  place  around  them  have  rendered  some  admin- 
istrative changes  expedient.  As  a  wise  and  judicious  prince,  as 
a  watchful  and  tender  father,  the  Pope  seems  to  believe  such  to 
be  the  fact,  and  to  be  determined  to  correct  the  former  and  to 
introduce  the  latter ;  and  for  this  he  has  been  applauded  to  the 
echo,  rather  in  the  hope  of  inducing  him  to  go  fjirther,  we  ap- 
prehend, than  from  any  real  satisfaction  felt  for  what  he  has  thus 
far  done  or  proposed.  But  we  confess,  that,  notwithstanding  the 
shouts  which  ring  in  our  ears,  and  the  loud  praises  he  h;is  se- 
cured from  those  whose  praise  is  always  suspicious,  we  have  seen 
in  him  not  the  least  conceivable  tendency  to  countenance  the 
misnamed  Libei-alism  now  so  rife  in  the  European  populations. 
They  who  flatter  themselves  that  the  Sovereign  Pontiff  of  Chris- 
tendom, is  about  to  ])lace  himself  at  the  head  of  the  Liberals, 
as  their  leader  in  the  war  against  legitimacy,  will  find  their  shouts 
have  been  premature,  and  their  hopes  fallacious.  That  Pius  the 
Ninth  is  the  father  of  his  people,  that  his  sympathies  are  with 
the  oppressed  and  down-trodden  of  all  nations,  that  he  is  the 
uncompromising  enemy  of  injustice  and  arbitrary  rule,  whether 
of  kings  or  peoples,  is  no  doubt  true,  and  in  saying  so  we  only 
say  he  is  Pope ;  but  because  this  is  true,  we  have  the  fullest  as- 
surance that  nothing  can  be  farther  from  his  thoughts  and  in- 
tentions than  to  countenance,  even  in  the  remotest  degree,  the 
mad  and  ruinous  radicalism  or  socialism  of  the  day,  or  that  it 
h[us  aught  to  hope  from  him  but  his  anathema. 

We  know  the  enemies  of  law  and  order  have  rejoiced  ;  we 
know  that  even  some  Catholics,  placing  their  politic-s,  uncon- 


POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 


310 


scioiisly  nc  doubt,  before  their  religion,  have  flattered  themselves 
that  our  Holy  Father  seeks  to  effect  an  alliance  between  Catho- 
licity and  modern  socialism  ;  but  he  is  the  Vicar  of  Jesus  Christ, 
not  a  pupil  from  the  school  of  the  apostate  De  Lamennais,  and 
can  no  more  form  an  alliance  with  socialism  than  with  despot- 
ism. One  Pope  is  not  in  the  habit  of  reversing,  in  what  involves 
a  principle,  the  decisions  of  another.  ^Ye  all  know  the  doctrine 
of  the  VAvenir;  we  all  know  that  after  the  revolution  of  July, 
1830,  De  Lamennais  sought  to  persuade  the  Church  to  make 
common  cause  with  the  European  populations  against  their  po- 
litical sovereigns,  to  throw  herself  into  the  arms  of  the  people, 
and  trust  for  her  support  to  their  holy  instincts  ;  and  we  all 
know  the  answer  he  received  from  Rome.  The  Church  throws 
herself  into  the  arms  of  neither  the  people  nor  the  sovereigns  ; 
she  relies  for  support  on  no  power  foreign  to  herself.  She  rests 
on  God  alone,  who  has  promised  to  be  with  her  all  days  unto 
the  consummation  of  the  world.  She  forms  no  alliances.  The 
sects  may  trim  their  sails  to  the  breeze,  and  appeal  now  to  des- 
potism and  now  to  liberalism,  now  seek  to  avail  themselves  of  a 
temperance  excitement,  and  now  of  an  Abolitionist  or  a  sociahst 
movement,  for  they  are  all  impotent  in  themselves,  and  can 
subsist  only  by  means  of  supplies  drawn  from  abroad.  But  the 
Church  draws  all  her  support  and  all  her  motive  power  from 
within,  from  God  himself.  Her  ensign  is  the  cross,  the  cross 
alone,  and  her  battle-cry,  from  the  first  to  the  last,  is  Deus  vult. 
As  she  withstood  the  despotic  tendency  of  kings  and  emperors 
in  the  Middle  Ages,  and  taught  the  sovereigns  that  they  held 
their  power  as  a  trust  from  God,  and  were  bound  to  exercise  it 
for  the  good  of  their  subjects,  so  will  she  withstand  the  popular 
tendencies  towards  license  and  anarchy,  and  teach  the  people 
that  their  duty  and  their  interest  are  in  the  maintenance  of  the 
order  Almighty  God  has  established  for  them,  and  in  frank  and 
conscientious  submission  to  law. 

Nothing  could  be  madder,  on  the  part  of  Catholics  with  us, 
than  to  adopt  the  radicalism  of  the  country.  Our  only  security 
here  is  in  the  supremacy  of  the  law,  and  the  prevailing  sense  of 


320  POLITICAL    CONSTITUTIONS. 

its  sacredness,  witlioiit  which  its  supremacy  is  impossible.  The 
Catholic  who  does  not  wish  to  pave  the  way  for  the  coniiscation 
of  the  property  of  his  Church,  and  for  the  suppression  of  his 
worship  in  these  States,  must  beware  how  he  binds  himself  to 
the  extreme  liberalism  of  the  country,  and  aids  the  tendency 
now  so  active,  under  the  name  of  progress,  to  svveep  away  all 
the  guaranties  of  law.  It  is  natural  that  persons  who  have  du- 
ring their  whole  lives  felt  only  the  pressure  of  government,  and 
known  government  only  in  its  abuses,  should  on  coming  here 
be  disposed  to  ado])t  extreme  views,  and  think  only  of  restricting 
the  sphere  and  diminishing  tlie  power  of  government ;  and  it  is 
natural  also,  that,  finding  their  religion  generally  unpopular,  they 
should  seek  to  conciliate  favor  for  it,  or  to  acquire  popularity  for 
themselves,  by  falling  in  with  the  popular  political  current,  and 
shoAving  themselves  enthusiastic  in  their  support  of  the  dominant 
tendency  of  the  country  ;  but  in  doing  either  they  are  as  far 
from  consulting  their  true  interest  as  they  are  their  duty  as  Cath- 
olics. Majorities  may  protect  themselves ;  minorities  have  no 
protection  but  in  the  saci-edness  and  supremacy  of  law.  The  law 
is  right  as  it  is  ;  we  must  study  to  keep  it  so ;  and  if  we  do,  we 
shall  always  throw  our  influence  on  the  conservative  side,  never 
on  the  radical  side. 

It  may  be  objected,  that  the  doctrine  we  contend  for  is  op- 
posed to  progress  ;  but  it  is  opposed  to  progress  in  no  sense  in 
which  progress  is  not  a  delusion.  There  is  progress  of  individu- 
als, but  no  progress  of  human  nature, — a  progress  of  particular 
nations,  but  none  of  the  race.  Nations  are  like  individuals ; 
they  are  born  with  their  peculiar  constitutions  and  capacities, 
which  determine  all  that  they  can  be.  They  grow  up  like  indi- 
viduals, attain  their  growth,  their  maturity,  decline  into  old  age, 
become  enfeebled,  and  die,  and  pass  away.  It  is  the  universal 
law,  and  there  is  no  elixir  vitce  for  nations  any  more  than  for 
individuals.  The  Rosicrucians  pretended  that  it  is  possible  in 
the  case  of  the  individual  to  ward  off  death  and  maintain  per- 
petual youth,  and  Godwin,  and  Balzac,  and  Bulwer  have  made 
the  notion  the  theme  of  interesting  romances,  as  all  know  who 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  321 

have  read  aS'^.  Leon,  Le  Centenaire,  and  Zanoni,  and  our  modern 
politicians  try  to  persuade  us  to  believe  the  same  is  possible  with 
regard  to  the  state  ;  but,  in  either  case,  it  5  a  mere  dream  of  the 
fancy  or  a  delusion  of  the  devil.  The  hmits  of  our  national  pro- 
gress are  fixed  by  the  inherent  principles  of  our  constitution,  and 
it  is  madness  to  dream  of  passing  beyond  them. 

In  conlusion,  we  would  express  our  thanks  to  the  translator 
of  the  excellent  little  work  which  we  have  made  the  text  of 
our  remarks.  He  has  done  his  task  with  taste  and  fidelity,  and 
the  notes  he  has  annexed  to  the  work  add  to  its  permanent 
value.  There  is  one  thing,  however,  the  translator  has  not 
done  ;  but  as  he  knows  what  it  is,  and  as  it  concerns  him  per- 
sonally, we  say  no  more.  Disagreeing  with  De  Maistre  as  to  his 
monarchical  views,  at  least  so  far  as  concerns  our  own  country, 
and  avowing  it  as  our  full  and  settled  conviction  that  the  desti- 
ny of  our  country  is  inseparable  from  the  destiny  of  its  republi- 
can constitution,  we  yet  recommend  his  Essay  as  worthy  of 
general  study,  and  as  almost  the  only  sensible  political  pamphlet 
that  has  ever  been  published  amongst  us.  Our  pohticians  may 
slight  it,  may  denounce  it,  and  denounce  us  for  recommending 
it ;  but  if  they  do,  so  much  the  worse  for  them,  so  much  the 
worse  for  the  country. 


WAR  AND   LOYALTY* 

OCTOBER,    1846. 


Our  orators  have  invested  the  Fourth  of  July  with  so  many 
disturbing  associations,  that  our  citizens  are  gradually  becoming 
less  and  less  disposed  to  greet  its  annual  return  with  those  fes- 
tivities which  it  was  the  hope  of  our  fathers  would  continue  to 

*  An  Oration  delivered  before  the  Authorities  of  the  City  of  Boston 
in  the  Tremont  Temple,  July  4,  1S46.  By  Fletcher  Webstek 
Boston  :  EastburL,     1846      8vo.     pp.  33. 


322  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

mai'k  it  tlirough  all  generations  to  come.  Still,  it  is  a  day 
sacred  in  the  affections  of  every  American  citizen,  and  it  cannot 
come  round  without  exciting  lively  emotions  of  gratitude  and 
joy  in  every  x\merican  heart.  The  birth  of  a  nation  is  an  event 
to  be  remembered,  and  the  day  on  which  it  takes  its  rank  in  the 
family  of  independent  nations  is  well  deserving  to  be  set  apart  by 
some  service,  at  once  joyous  and  solemn,  recounting  the  glory 
which  has  been  won,  the  blessings  which  have  been  received, 
and  pointing  to  the  high  destiny  and  grave  responsibilities  to 
which  the  new  people  are  called. 

The  orations  ordinarily  given  on  our  national  anniversary  are 
of  that  peculiar  sort  which  it  is  said  neither  gods  nor  men  can 
tolerate.  They  are  tawdry  and  turgid,  full  of  stale  declama- 
tion about  liberty,  fulsome  and  disgusting  glorification  of  our- 
seh'es  as  a  people,  or  uncalled-for  denunciations  of  those  states 
and  empires  that  have  not  seen  proper  to  adopt  political  institu- 
tions sin)i!ar  to  our  own.  Yet  we  may,  perhaps,  be  too  fastidi- 
ous in  our  taste,  and  too  sweeping  1n  our  censures.  Boys  will 
be  boys,  and  dulncss  will  be  dulness,  and  wlien  either  is  install- 
ed* "  orator  of  the  day,"  the  performance  must  needs  be  boyish 
or  dull.  But  when  the  number  of  orations  annually  called  forth 
by  our  national  jubilee,  from  all  sorts  of  pei-sons,  throughout  the 
length  and  breadth  of  the  land,  is  considered,  we  may  rather 
wonder  that  so  many  are  produced  which  do  credit  to  their  au- 
thors, and  fall  not  far  below  the  occasion,  than  that  there  are  so 
few.  All  are  not  mere  school-boy  productions  ;  all  are  not  pat- 
riotism on  tiptoe,  nor  eloquence  on  stilts.  Every  year  sends  out 
not  a  few,  which,  for  their  sound  sense,  deep  thought,  subdued 
passion,  earnest  spirit,  manly  tone,  and  chaste  expression,  de- 
serve an  honorable  place  in  our  national  literature.  There  are — 
and  perhaps  as  large  a  proportion  as  ^ve  ought  to  expect — 
Fourth  of  July  orators,  who,  while  they  indulge  in  not  unseem- 
ly exultations,  forget  to  disgust  us  with  untimely  rant  about 
self-government,  the  marvellous  virtue  and  intelligence  of  the 
masses,  and  the  industrial  miracles  they  are  daily  performing; 
who  show  by  their  reserve,  rather  than  by  their  noisy  declama- 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  323 

tioD,  that  they  have  American  hearts,  and  confidence  in  Ameri- 
can patriotism  and  American  institutions.  A  people  not  facti- 
tiously great  has  no  occasion  to  speak  of  its  greatness  ;  and 
true  patriotism  expresses  itself  in  deeds,  not  words.  The  real 
American  patriots  are  not  those  shallow  brains  and  gizzard 
hearts  which  are  always  prating  of  the  American  spirit,  Ameri- 
can genius,  American  interests,  x\merican  greatness,  and  calling 
for  an  American  party ;  but  those  calm,  quiet,  self-possessed 
spirits  who  rarely  think  of  asking  themselves  whether  they  are 
Aiflericans  or  not,  and  who  are  too  sincere  and  ardent  in  their 
patrotism  to  imagine  it  can  be  necessary  to  parade  its  titles. 
Their  patriotism  has  no  suspicions,  no  jealousies,  no  fears,  no 
self-consciousness.  It  is  too  deep  for  words.  It  is  silent,  majes- 
tic. It  is  where  the  country  is,  does  what  she  bids,  and,  though 
sacrificing  all  upon  her  altars,  never  dreams  that  it  is  doing  any 
thing  extraordinary.  There  is,  perhaps,  more  of  this  genuine 
patriotism  in  the  American  people  than  strangers,  or  even  we 
ourselves,  commonly  suppose.  The  foam  floats  on  the  surface, 
and  is  whirled  hither  and  thither  by  each  shifting  breeze  ;  but 
below  are  the  sweet,  silent,  and  deep  waters. 

Among  the  orations  delivered  on  our  great  national  festival, 
which  we  would  not  willingly  forget,  the  one  before  us  by  Mr. 
Fletcher  Webster,  eldest  son  of  the  Hon.  Daniel  Webster,  de- 
serves a  high  rank.  It  is  free  from  the  principal  faults  to  which 
we  have  alluded,  simple  and  chaste  in  its  style  and  language, 
bold  and  manly  in  its  tone  and  spirit,  and,  in  the  main,  sound 
and  just  in  doctrine  and  sentiment.  It  frequently  reminds  us 
of  the  qualities  which  mark  the  productions  of  the  author's  dis- 
tinguished father,  and  which  have  placed  him  at  the  head  of 
American  orators ;  and  it  bears  ample  evidence,  that,  with  time, 
experience,  and  effort,  the  son  need  not  be  found  unworthy  of 
such  a  father. 

Certainly,  we  do  not  subscribe  to  every  sentiment,  view,  or 
argument  of  this  eloquent  oration  ;  but  we  hke  its  frank  and 
manly  tone,  its  independent  and  earnest  spirit,  and  we  accept 
without  reserve  the  leading  doctrine  it  was  designed  to  set 


324  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

forth.  We  are  also  grateful  to  Mr.  Webster  for  having  had 
the  moral  courage  to  assert  great  truths  in  a  community  where 
they  can  win  little  applause,  and  to  administer  a  well  merited 
rebuke  to  certain  dangerous  ultraisms  when  and  where  it  was 
not  uncalled  for.  He  has  proved  that  he  is  not  unworthy  to 
be  reckoned  a  freeman  and  a  patriot,  and  he  deserves  and  will 
receive  the  approbation  of  all  who  can  distinguish  between 
words  and  things,  and  i)refer  sound  sense  and  solid  wisdom  to 
mad  flmaticism  and  hollow^  cant.  It  is  cheering  to  find  our 
young  men  rising  above  the  tendencies  of  the  age  and  country, 
and  manifesting  some  respect  for  the  wisdom  and  virtue  of  their 
ancestors,  and  indicating  that  they  have  some  suspicion  that  all 
that  is  wise  and  just  was  not  born  with  the  new  generation  and 
possibly  may  not  die  with  it.  It  permits  us  to  hope  things  may 
not  have  gone  quite  so  badly  with  us  as  we  had  feared ;  that 
the  people  are  less  unsound  at  the  core  than  we  had  dared  be- 
lieve ;  that,  after  all,  there  is  a  redeeming  spirit  at  work  among 
them ;  and  that  our  noble  experiment  in  behalf  of  popular  in- 
stitutions may  not  be  destined  to  a  speedy  failure. 

Our  great  danger  lies  in  the  radical  tendency  which  has  be- 
come so  wide,  deep,  and  active  in  the  American  people.  We 
have,  to  a  great  extent,  ceased  to  regard  any  thing  as  sacred  or 
venerable ;  we  spurn  what  is  old ;  war  against  what  is  fixed ; 
and  labor  to  set  all  religious,  domestic,  and  social  institutions 
afloat  on  the  wild  and  tumultuous  sea  of  speculation  and  experi- 
ment. Nothing  has  hitherto  gone  light;  nothing  has  been 
achieved  that  is  worth  retaining ;  and  man  and  Providence  have 
thus  far  done  nothing  but  commit  one  continued  series  of  blun- 
ders. All  things  are  to  be  reconstructed ;  the  world  is  to  be 
recast,  and  by  our  own  wisdom  and  strength.  We  must  bor- 
row no  light  from  the  past,  adopt  none  of  its  maxims,  and  take 
no  doM  from  its  experience.  Even  language  itself,  which  only 
embodies  the  thoughts,  convictions,  sentiments,  hopes,  affections, 
and  aspirations  of  the  race,  cannot  serve  as  a  medium  of  inter- 
course between  man  and  man.  It  is  not  safe  to  affirm  that 
black  is  black,  for  the  word  black  only  names  an  idea  which  the 


WAR    AXD    LOYALTY.  325 

past  entertained,  and  most  likely  a  false  idea.  With  such  a 
tendency,  wide  and  deep,  strong  and  active,  we  cannot  but  ap- 
prehend the  most  serious  dangers.  With  it  there  can  be  no 
permanent  institutions,  no  government,  no  society,  no  virtue,  no 
well-being. 

There  is  much  to  strengthen  this  radical  tendency.  It  is 
natural  to  the  inexperienced,  the  conceited,  and  the  vain ;  and 
it  can  hardly  foil  to  be  powerful  in  a  community  where  these 
have  facilities  for  occupying  prominent  and  commanding  posi- 
tions. Young  enthusiasts,  taught  to  "remember,  when  they 
are  old,  not  to  forget  the  dreams  of  their  youth,"  that  is,  not  to 
profit  by  experience,  and  not  doubting  that  w^hat  they  were 
ignorant  of  yesterday  was  known  by  no  one,  and  that  they  must 
needs  be  as  far  in  advance  of  all  the  world  as  they  are  of  their 
own  infancy,  bring  benevolent  affection,  disinterested  zeal,  and 
conscientiousness  to  its  aid  ;  political  aspirants,  reckless  of  prin- 
ciple and  greedy  of  place,  appeal  to  it  as  their  most  facile  means 
of  success ;  and  the  mass  of  the  people,  finding  their  passions 
flattered,  and  their  prejudices  undisturbed,  are  thrown  off  their 
guard,  presume  all  is  right,  and  cherish  unconsciously  the  ene- 
my that  is  to  destroy  them.  A  factitious  public  opinion  2:rows 
up,  becomes  supreme,  to  which  whoever  wishes  for  some  con- 
sideration in  the  community  in  which  he  lives,  must  offer  in- 
cense, and  which  he  must  presume  on  no  occasion  to  contradict. 
The  majority  of  the  people,  indeed,  may  not  be  represented  by  this 
opinion, — may,  it  is  true,  not  approve  it ;  but  they  are  isolated 
one  from  another,  minding  each  their  own  affairs,  and  ignorant 
of  their  numbers  and  strength ;  while  the  few,  by  their  union, 
mutual  acquaintance,  concert,  and  clamor,  are  able  to  silence 
any  single  voice  not  raised  in  adulation  of  their  idol.  Political 
parties  conspire  to  the  same  end.  One  party  to-day,  ambitious 
of  success,  courts  this  factitious  public  opinion  as  a  useful  aux- 
iliary, and  succeeds;  the  other  must  do  so  to-morrow,  or 
abandon  all  hopes  of  succeeding.  Then  follows  a  strife  of 
parties,  which  shall  bid  highest,  and  outradical  the  other.  The 
radical  tendency  is  thus  daily  exaggerated  by  those  who  in 


326  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

reality  disapprove  it,  and  in  their  feelings  have  no  sympathy 
with  it.  Hence,  the  evil  goes  ever  from  bad  to  v/orse.  Un- 
happily, this  is  no  fancy  sketch.  We  have  seen  it,  and  we  see 
it  daily  pass  under  our  own  eyes,  and  not,  we  confess,  without 
lively  alarm  for  our  beloved  country  and  her  popular  insti- 
tutions. 

It  is,  therefore,  with  more  than  ordinary  pleasure  that  we  see 
amono"  our  young  men,  in  whose  hands  are  the  destinies  of  our 
country,  whose  views  and  passions  and  interests  must  be  con- 
sulted by  any  party  aspiring  to  power  and  place,  some  symp- 
toms of  an  opposing  tendency.  Right  glad  are  we  that  the 
young  "  sovereigns"  show  some  signs  of  beginning  to  take  sound- 
er and  more  practical  views,  and  to  cherish  a  reaction  against 
the  ultraisms  of  the  day.  This  oration,  and  some  other  indica- 
tions, which  have  not  escaped  our  notice,  prove  to  us  that  there 
is  a  returning  respect  for  the  wisdom  of  experience,  and  that 
the  reign  of  the  Garrisons,  the  Parkers,  the  Sumners,  the  O'Sul- 
livans,  the  Channings,  the  Abby  Folsoms,  et  id  omne  (jenus,  ap- 
proaches its  termination,  and  that  henceforth  practical  sense  and 
wise  experience  will  at  least  dispute  the  throne  with  fanatic  zeal, 
blind  enthusiasm,  and  bloated  conceit. 

In  preparing  this  oration,  Mr.  Webster  must  have  been  con- 
scious that  he  was  running  athwart  the  views  of  many  whom 
most  of  us  have  been  accustomed  to  hold  in  high  esteem,  and 
that,  in  venturing  to  assert  the  lawfulness  of  war  and  the  obli- 
gation of  the  citizen  to  obey  the  government,  he  would  be  at- 
tacking every  class  of  fanatics  in  the  land,  and  could  not  fail  to 
incur  the  unmitigated  wrath  and  hostility  of  the  whole  modern 
"  Peace "  party.  Yet  his  courage  did  not  fail  him.  He  does 
not  appear  to  have  had  any  misgivings  before  even  the  awful 
shade  of  the  late  Noah  Worcester,  founder  of  the  American 
Peace  Society,  and  he  has  dared  consult  his  relations  as  a  man 
and  a  citizen,  and  to  lay  it  down  as  his  rule  of  action,  that  he  is 
responsible,  not  to  the  self-created  associations  of  the  day,  to 
the  reigning  cant  of  the  time  and  place,  but  solely  to  his  God 
and  his  country.     For  this,  however  much  he  may  be  condemned 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  327 

bj  fanatical  reformers,  we  honor  him,  and  for  this  every  nght- 
minded  man  will  honor  him  ;  for  in  this  he  has  asserted  his  in- 
dependence, and  set  an  example  worthy  of  imitation. 

The  main  topic  of  this  oration  is  the  lawfidness  of  war,  and 
the  duty  of  the  citizen  to  obey  the  government, — a  topic  at  all 
times  interesting  and  important,  and  especiall}'-  so  at  this  time, 
when  we  are  actually  engaged  in  a  war  with  a  neighboring  re- 
public, the  necessity  of  which  is  questioned  by  many  of  our  cit- 
izens ;  and  when  there  is  widely  prevalent  a  notion  that  the  cit- 
izen is  under  no  moral  obligation  to  obey  the  law,  if  it  does  not 
chance  to  coincide  with  his  own  private  convictions  of  justice 
and  expediency.  We  agree  in  the  main  with  the  view  of  this 
topic  which  the  author  takes,  and  gladly  avail  ourselves  of  the 
occasion  to  make  some  additional  remarks  of  our  own,  which 
ma}^  tend  to  illustrate  and  confirm  it,  though  the  readers  of  the 
oration  may,  perhaps,  consider  them  quite  superfluous. 

The  war  of  1812,  declared  by  this  country  against  Great 
Britain,  as  is  well  known,  was  exceedingly  unpopular  in  the  New- 
England  States, — not,  iHdeed,  in  consequence  of  any  especial 
partiality  for  Great  Britain  herself,  nor  because  they  were  less 
patriotic  than  the  other  members  of  the  confederacy,  but  be- 
cause the  chief  burdens  of  the  war  fell  upon  them,  in  the  ruin 
it  brought  to  their  commerce  and  its  dependent  interests,  then 
their  principal  interests.  It  is  not  for  us  to  pronounce  any  opin- 
ion on  the  justice  or  expediency  of  that  wai- ;  but  we  cannot 
censure  with  extreme  severity  the  New  England  people  for  be- 
ing strongly  opposed  to  it.  Yet  there  can  be  no  question,  that, 
in  the  madness  of  the  moment,  the  opposition  was  carried  to 
wholly  unjustifiable  lengths,  and,  though  we  willingly  acquit  it 
of  all  treasonable  intentions,  it  in  reality  stopped  only  this  side 
of  treason.  Some  weak-minded  but  well  disposed  New  England 
mi::isters,  incapable  of  taking  comprehensive  views  and  of  seek- 
ing to  remedy  an  evil  by  attacking  it  in  its  principle,  seeing  the 
danger  to  the  union,  to  the  stabiHty  of  our  institutions,  occa- 
sioned by  the  opposition  to  the  war,  which  they  never  thought 


328  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

of  censuring  or  attempting  to  moderate,  lamenting  the  very  se- 
rious evils  suffered  by  their  friends  and  neighbors,  and  taking  it 
for  granted  that  the  war  was  wholly  unnecessary  and  unjust, 
made  the  grand  discovery  in  moral  theology  that  war  is  malum 
in  se,  is  always  unnecessary,  and  can  never  be  lawful.  They 
without  much  delay  proceeded,  more  suo,  to  form  an  association 
ao-ainst  war,  and  to  preach,  lecture,  and  issue  tracts  in  favor  of 
universal  peace.  They  appealed  to  the  prejudices  against  the 
actual  war,  and  to  general  philanthropy.  New  Englanders,  es- 
pecially Bostonians,  are  rarely  insensible  to  the  appeal  to  philan- 
thropy. Since  the  softening  down  of  some  of  the  asperities  of 
their  primitive  Puritanism,  which  took  place  in  the  latter  half 
of  the  last  century,  they  have  been  justly  remarkable  for  their 
philanthropy, — no  people  in  the  world  more  so.  Industrious, 
frugal,  economical,  they  certainly  are  ;  but  mean,  sordid,  miserly, 
they  are  not,  and  are  incapable  of  being.  They  are,  in  truth, 
open,  frank,  generous,  and  liberal,  with  a  sort  of  passion  for 
world  reform,  which  is  one  of  their  foibles.  The  unpopularity 
of  the  war  of  1812,  and  the  popularity  of  the  appeal  to  philan- 
thropy, gave  to  the  peace  movement  a  speedy  and  strong  sup- 
port, till  peace  became  a  sort  of  cant  among  us,  and  it  was  haz- 
ardous to  one's  reputation  to  intimate  that  war,  terrible  as  may 
be  its  evils,  is  nevertheless  sometimes  just  and  necessary. 

But  the  genuine  Yankee  is  never  satisfied  with  doing  only 
one  thing  at  a  time.  He  is  really  in  his  glory  only  when  he 
has  some  dozen  or  more  irons  all  in  the  fire  at  once.  The  sim- 
ple question  of  peace  could  by  no  means  absorb  his  superabund- 
ant zeal  and  philanthropy,  so  he  invented  and  set  on  foot  anti- 
slavery  and  various  other  movements,  all  of  which  adopted  the 
"  peace  principle  ;"  for  the  chief  actors  in  one  were,  for  the  most 
part,  prominent  actors  in  all.  By  means  of  agitation,  froth  and 
foam,  declamation  and  rant,  of  conventions,  agents,  tracts,  lec- 
tures, sermons,  periodicals,  a  new  code  of  morals  has  been  grad- 
ually framed  among  us  ;  all  that  was  once  regarded  as  settled 
is  now  called  in  question  ;  what  was  approved  by  the  generations 
which  preceded  us  is  now  pronounced  low,  earthly,  sensual,  devil- 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  329 

ish  ;  the  fairest  reputations  are  blackened  ;  our  own  patriots 
and  heroes  are  cakimniated,  and  even  Washington  himself  has 
been  publicly  branded  as  an  "  inhuman  butcher."  We  are  cast 
completely  adrift.  There  was  no  true  morality  in  the  world  be- 
fore these  modern  societies  sprung  from  the  womb  of  night,  and 
we  are  required  to  look  to  a  few  canting  ministers,  strolling 
spinsters,  and  beardless  youths,  as  the  sole  authoritative  ex- 
pounders of  the  precepts  of  the  divine  law.  We  are  unable  to 
determine  what  it  is  safe  to  eat  or  to  drink,  when  to  rise  up  or 
sit  down,  unless  some  of  these  self-constituted  guides  condescend 
to  inform  us.  Sin  and  death  hover  everywhere ;  poison  lurks 
in  every  thing,  even  in  the  bread  made  from  the  finest  wheat, 
and  in  the  purest  water  from  the  fountain  ;  and  there  seems  to  be 
no  possible  means  of  living  but  to  go  naked  and  cease  to  eat  or 
drink.  It  is  a  wonder  how  the  world  has  contrived,  for  six 
thousand  yeai-s,  to  get  on,  how  men  and  women  have  contrived 
to  be  born,  to  hve,  to  gi'ow,  and  to  persuade  theipselves  that 
they  enjoy  a  tolerable  share  of  health  and  vigor,  both  of  mind 
and  body. 

The  joke,  in  fact,  becomes  serious.  Many  of  the  rising  gener- 
ation are  beginning  to  take  it,  not  as  a  dull  jest,  but  as  down- 
right earnest.  It  interferes  quite  too  much  with  the  social  and 
domestic  business  of  life,  and,  if  continued  much  longer,  will  re- 
duce the  great  mass  of  us  to  mere  automata.  It  is,  therefore, 
high  time  for  what  sober  sense,  for  what  decency,  there  may 
have  been  left  in  the  community  to  speak  out,  send  these  fanat- 
ics back  to  their  native  inanity,  and  let  it  be  known,  that,  though 
for  a  time  we  have  suffered  ourselves  to  be  made  fools  of,  after 
all,  Tve  are  not  quite  so  stupid,  so  vain  or  conceited,  as  to  imag- 
ine that  nobody  understood  or  practised  the  moral  virtues  till 
our  modern  associations  burst  from  darkness  to  teach  them  ;  that 
we  really  have  not  sunk  so  low  as  to  lose  all  respect  for  our  an- 
cestors, all  reverence  for  the  awful  past,  over  which  has  flowed 
the  tide  of  human  joy  and  human  sorrow,  and  to  be  wholly  un- 
able to  serve  our  own  generation  without  calumniating  those 
which  have  placed  us  in  the  world  and  made  us  what  we  are. 


330  "^AR    AND    LOYALTY. 

He  is  a  foolish  as  well  as  a  wicked  son  who  curses  the  mother 
that  bore  him.  There  has  been,  from  the  first,  a  Providence 
that  has  watched  over  and  ruled  in  the  affairs  of  men  ;  our  dis- 
tant forefathers  had  eyes,  ears,  hands,  intellects,  hearts,  as  well 
as  we,  and  knew  how  to  use  them,  and  did  use  them,  not  al- 
ways ineflfectually.  How,  indeed,  would  the  hoary  Past,  were  it 
not  that  experience  has  made  it  wise  and  taught  it  to  make  al- 
lowances for  the  follies  and  pranks  of  youth,  laugh  at  our  solemn 
airs  and  grave  decisions !  How  should  we  hang  our  heads  and 
blush,  even  to  the  tips  of  our  ears,  could  we  but  for  one  moment 
see  ourselves  as  it  sees  us!  "The  son,"  says  the  proverb, 
"  thinks  his  father  a  fool ;  the  fother  knows  his  son  to  be  one." 
The  more  we  study  what  has  been,  the  less  disposed  shall  we  be 
to  exult  in  what  is.  Happily,  we  begin  to  discover  some  symp- 
toms that  there  are  those  among  us,  who  have,  now  and  then,  at 
least,  a  suspicion  that  change  is  not  always  progress,  and  that 
it  is  more  creditable  to  be  able  to  revere  wisdom  than  to  con- 
temn it. 

War,  against  which  nearly  all  our  modern  fanatics  declaim  so 
much,  and  which  in  the  new  moral  code  is  utterly  prohibited,  is, 
of  course,  not  a  thing  to  be  sought  for  its  own  sake.  Its  necess- 
ity must  always  be  lamented,  as  we  must  always  lament  that 
there  are  crimes  to  be  redressed,  or  criminals  to  be  punished,  or 
diseases  to  be  cured.  But  because  we  must  always  lament  that 
there  are  offenders  to  be  punished,  it  does  not  follow  that  to 
punish  them  is  never  necessary,  or  that  their  punishment  is  an 
e\'il,  and  morally  wrong ;  or  because  it  is  to  be  regretted  that 
there  are  diseases,  that  we  must  treat  the  physician  and  his 
drugs  as  a  nuisance.  The  iiither  weeps  that  he  has  occasion  to 
chastise  his  child,  but  knows  that  "  to  spare  the  rod  is  to  spoil 
the  child  ;"  nor  does  it  necessarily  follow,  because  war  involves 
terrible  evils,  and  is  to  be  avoided  whenever  it  can  be  without 
sacrificing  the  public  weal,  that  it  is  in  itself  wrong,  and  may 
never  be  resorted  to  without  violating  the  law  of  God.  Its  ne- 
cessity is  an  evil,  but,  as  a  remedy,  it  may  be  just  and  beneficial. 
Disease  is  an  evil,  but  not,  therefore,  the  medicine  that  restores 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  331 

to  health.  War  is  a  violent  remedy  for  a  violent  disease,  and 
as  such  may,  when  all  other  remedies  prove  or  must  prove  in- 
effectual, be  resorted  to  without  sin.  We,  therefore,  venture  to 
maintain,  in  the  very  face  of  our  modern  fanatics,  that  war  de- 
clared by  the  sovereign  authority  of  the  state,  for  a  just  cause, 
and  prosecuted  with  right  intentions,  is  not  morally  wrong,  and 
may  be  engaged  in  w'ith  a  safe  conscience. 

That  war  is  not  morally  wrong,  in  itself,  is  e\ndent  from  the 
fact,  that  Almighty  God  has  himself,  on  several  occasions,  as  in 
the  case  of  the  ancient  Israelites,  actually  commanded  or  ap- 
proved it.  But  God  cannot  command  or  approve  what  is  mor- 
ally wrong,  without  doing  wrong  himself;  which  is  absurd  and 
impious  to  suppose.  It  cannot  be  in  itself  morally  wrong,  unless 
prohibited  by  some  law ;  but  there  is  no  law  which  prohibits  it. 
It  is  not  prohibited  by  the  law  of  nature.  By  the  law  of  na- 
ture, the  individual  has  the  right  to  defend  and  avenge  him- 
self. Justice  not  only  forbids  wrong  to  be  done,  but  requires 
that  the  wTong  done  be  avenged.  In  a  state  of  nature  where 
there  is  no  established  government,  but  each  indindual  is  left 
to  his  own  sovereignty,  each  one  has  the  right  of  defending  and 
avenging  himself  in  his  own  hands.  If  this  be  true  of  a  pri- 
vate person,  it  must  also  be  true  of  the  state  or  nation ;  for  na- 
tions have  precisely  the  same  rights  in  relation  to  one  another 
that  individuals  have.  They  then,  who  admit  no  law  but  the 
law  of  nature,  must  concede  that  war  is  not  prohibited. 

IVTor  is  war  prohibited  by  the  divine  law.  This  all  will  readi- 
ly grant  to  be  true,  so  far  as  concerns  the  old  law,  which  no- 
where condemns  war,  and  not  frequently  presents  us  God  him- 
self as  commanding  or  approving  it.  It  is  also  true,  so  far  as 
concerns  the  new  law,  or  Christian  law.  "  If  Christian  discip- 
line, "  says  St.  Augustine,  "  condemned  all  wars,  the  Gospel 
would  have  given  this  counsel  of  salvation  to  the  soldiers  who 
asked  what  they  should  do,  that  they  should  throw  aw^ay  their 
arms  and  withdraw  themselves  from  the  military  service  alto- 
gether. But  it  says  to  them,  '  Do  violence  to  no  man,  calumni- 
ate no  one,  and  be  content  with  your  wages.'     St.  Luke  iii.  14. 


332  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

Surely  it  does  not  prohibit  the  mihtary  service  to  those  whom  it 
commands  to  be  contented  with  its  wages."  '^ 

Our  Lord,  St.  Matt.  viii.  10,  commends  the  faith  of  a  centu 
rion  who  had  soldiers  under  his  command,  says  he  had  not 
found  so  great  faith  in  Israel,  and  yet  does  not  order  him  to 
throw  away  his  arms,  or  abandon  the  mihtary  service.  Corne- 
lius, Acts  X.  2,  "  a  centurion  of  the  band  which  is  called  Itahan," 
is  commended  as  "  a  religious  man,  fearing  God ; "  and  the  bles- 
sed Apostle  Paul,  Heb.  xi-  32-34,  praises  Gedcon,  Barac,  Sam- 
son, and  others,  "  who  through  faith  subdued  kingdoms,  became 
valiant  in  war,  put  to  flight  the  armies  of  foreigners."  These 
considerations  show  that  war  is  not  prohibited  by  the  Christian 
law.  Then  it  is  prohibited  by  no  law,  and  therefore  is  not  nec- 
essarily sinful,  but  may  be  just  and  expedient. 

But  it  is  objected,  that  there  are  certain  passages  in  the  New 
Testament  which,  if  not  expressly,  yet  by  implication,  evidently 
deny  the  lawfulness  of  war.  1.  "All  that  take  the  sword  shall 
perish  by  the  sword."  St.  Matt.  xxvi.  52.  But  to  take  the 
sword  is  to  use  the  sword  without  the  order  or  consent  of  the 
proper  authority.  He  who  only  uses  the  sword  by  order  or  con- 
sent of  the  proper  authority,  that  is,  of  the  political  sovereign? 
if  he  be  a  private  person,  or  of  God,  if  he  be  a  public  person  or 
sovereign  prince,  does  not  take  the  sword,  but  simply  uses  the 
sword  committed  to  him.  Nor  are  we  to  understand  that  all  who 
take  the  sw^ord  on  incompetent  authority  will  be  literally  slain, 
but  that  they  will  perish  by  their  own  sword,  that  is,  be  punish- 
ed eternally  for  their  sin,  if  they  do  not  repent.f 

2.  "  I  say  unto  you,  not  to  resist  evil ;  but  if  any  man  strike 

*  "  Nam  si  Christiana  disciplina  omnia  bella  culparet,  hoc  potius 
militibus  consilium  salutis  petentibus  in  Evangelic  diceretur,  ut  abji- 
cerent  arma,  seque  omnino  militiae  subtraherent.  Dictum  est  autem 
eis,  JVeminem  concusseritis,  nuNi  cahimniam  feceritis  ,•  svfficiat 
vohis  stipendium  vestrum.  Quibus  proprium  stipendium  suflicere  de- 
bere  praecepit,  militare  utique  non  prohibuit."  Epist.  V.,  Ad  Marcel- 
linum,  c.  2.  15.  n. 

t  See  St.  Augustine,  Contra  Faustum^  lib.  22,  c.  70,  and  St.  Thomas, 
Summa,  2.  9   Q.  40,  a.  1. 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  333 

thee  on  thy  right  cheek,  turn  to  him  the  other  also."  St.  Matt. 
V.  39.  War  is  resistance  of  evil ;  but  this  text  forbids  the  re- 
sistance of  evil ;  therefore  it  forbids  war.  But  the  precept  re- 
fers to  the  interior  disposition,  and  commands  that  preparation 
of  the  heart  which  does  not  resist  evil  by  rendering  evil  for  evil, 
but  endures  patiently  whatever  wrongs  or  injuries  are  necessary 
for  the  honor  of  God  and  the  salvation  of  men.  It  is  not  to  be 
understood  to  the  letter,  for  our  Lord,  who  fulfilled  it,  when 
struck  in  his  face,  did  not  turn  the  other  cheek,  but  defended 
himself  by  reasoning.  It  commands  patience  under  wrongs  and 
insults,  and  forbids  us  to  seek  to  avenge  ourselves  on  our  own 
authority  ;  but  it  does  not  prohibit  the  redress  of  wrongs  by  the 
proper  authorities ;  because  we  know  from  the  testimony  of  St. 
Paul  that  the  magistrate  is  "  the  minister  of  God,  an  avenger 
to  execute  wrath  upon  him  that  doeth  evil."  Rom.  xiii.  4. 
Wrongs,  when  redressed  by  the  proper  authority,  may  be  re- 
dressed without  any  malignant  feehngs,  and,  indeed,  with  the 
most  benevolent  intentions  towards  the  wrong-doer.  Wrongs 
are  not,  in  all  cases,  to  go  unavenged,  otherwise  God  would 
not  have  appointed  a  ministry  to  avenge  them.  It  is  often 
the  greatest  of  evils  to  suffer  offences  to  go  unpunished,  and  one 
of  the  most  certain  methods  of  preventing  them  is  for  the  uag- 
istrate  to  let  it  be  known  and  undei-stood  that  they  cannot  be 
committed  with  impunity.* 

*  "  Sunt  ergo  ista  praecepta  patientiae  semper  in  cordis  proeparatione 
retinenda,  ipsaque  benevolentia,  ne  reddatur  malum  pro  malo,  semper  in 
voluntate  complenda  est.  Agenda  sunt  autem  multa,  etiam  cum  invitis 
benigna  quadam  asperitate  plectendis,  quorum  potius  utilitati  consu- 

lenda  est  quam  voluntati Nam  in  corripiendo  filio  quamlibet 

aspere,  nunquam  amor  paternus  amittitur.  Fit  tamen  quod  no  lit  et 
doleat,  qui  etiam  videtur  dolore  sanandus.  Ac  per  hoc  si  terrena  ista 
respublica  praecepta  Christiana  custodiat,  et  ipsa  bella  sine  benevolen- 
tia non  gerentur,  ut  ad  pietatis  justitiaeque  pacatam  societatem  victis 
facilius  consulatur.  Nam  cui  licentia  iniquitatis  eripitur,  utiliter,  vin- 
citur;  quoniam  nihil  est  infelicius  felicitate  peccantium,  qua  pcenalis 
nutritur  impunitas,  et  mala  voluntas  velut  hostis  interior  roboratur." 
S.  Aug.  ubi  sup.  et  de  Serm.  Domini,  lib.  1,  c.  19,  and  also  St.  Thom- 
as,  ubi  sup. 


334  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

3.  "Revenge  not  yourselves,  my  dearly  beloved,  but  give 
place  to  wrath  ;  for  it  is  written,  Vengeance  is  mine,  and  I  will 
repay,  saith  the  Lord."  Rom.  xii.  19.  This,  though  rehed  on 
by  the  peace  party,  is  not  to  the  purpose,  for  it  speaks  of  pri- 
vate revenge,  which  every  body  admits  is  condemned  by  the 
Christian  law.  It  is  of  the  same  import  with  the  text  we  have 
just  dismissed.  It  simply  commands  patience  under  injuries, 
forbearance  towards  those  who  do  us  wrong,  and  forbids  us  to 
seek  redress  of  wrongs  done  us  in  a  resentful  spirit,  or  by  our 
own  hands  or  authority.  But  it  does  not  necessarily  imply  that 
the  public  authority,  which  is  the  minister  of  God,  may  not  re- 
dress them,  or  that  the  commonwealth  may  not  repel  or  vindi- 
cate attacks  upon  itself,  whether  they  come  from  within  or  from 
without.  To  avenge  wrongs  is  not  in  itself  wrong,  because  it  is 
said  the  Lord  "  will  repay  ;"  nor  is  it  wrong  for  the  magistrate 
to  avenge  them,  for  "he  is  the  minister  of  God,  an  avenger,"  as 
we  have  seen,  "  to  execute  wrath  upon  him  that  doeth  evil ;" 
and  it  is  wrong  for  the  individual  to  do  it  only  because  in  civil 
society  his  natural  light  to  do  so  is  taken  away,  and  because  it 
is  made  his  duty  to  leave  it  to  God  or  the  minister  God  in  his 
providence  appoints. 

4.  "  For  the  weapons  of  our  warfare  are  not  carnal,  but  pow- 
erful through  God."  2  Cor.  x.  4.  But  St.  Paul  is  speaking, 
not  of  the  sword  which  the  magistrate  bears,  nor  of  that  which 
the  sovereign  state,  as  the  minister  of  God  to  execute  wrath, 
may  put  into  the  hands  of  its  servants,  but  of  the  weapons  to  be 
used  in  the  conversion  of  infidels  and  sinners.  These,  indeed, 
are  not  carnal,  but  spiritual,  and  powerful  through  the  virtue 
God  confers  on  them.  Carnal  weapons  are  unlawful  in  the 
work  of  conversion,  for  conversion  is  not  conversion  unless  volun- 
tary. God  says  to  the  sinner,  "  Give  me  thy  heart,"  that  is,  thy 
will ;  and  this  carnal  weapons  can  force  no  man  give.  It  can 
be  subdued  only  by  spiritual  arms,  rendered  effectual  through 
divine  grace.  But  this  says  nothing  against  the  lawfulness  of 
repelhng  or  avenging  injustice  whether  from  subjects  or  foreign- 
ers, by  the  proper  authorities.     These  several  texts,  tl>en,  n?ake 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  335 

nothing  against  our  general  conclusion,  that  war  is  not,  in  all 
cases,  prohibited  by  the  Christian  law. 

But  we  are  told,  still  further,  that  war  is  opposed  to  peace  ; 
yet  the  Gospel  is  a  Gospel  of  peace,  commands  peace,  and  pro- 
nounces a  blessing  on  peacemakers.  "  Beati  pacijici,  quoniam 
Jilii  Dei  vocahuntury  St.  Matt.  v.  9.  War,  undertaken  for 
its  own  sake,  looking  to  itself  as  the  end,  is  opposed  to  peace, 
and  unlawful,  we  grant ;  but  war,  undertaken  for  the  sake  of 
obtaining  a  just  and  lasting  peace,  is  not  opposed  to  peace,  but 
may  be  the  only  means  possible  of  restoring  and  securing  it. 
Peace  is  then  \villed  the  intentions  are  peaceful,  and  war,  as  a 
necessity,  becomes  itself  a  peacemaker,  and  as  such  is  lawful, 
and  its  prosecutors  are  not  necessarily  deprived  of  the  blessing 
pronounced  on  peacemakers.  Hence,  St.  Augustine  says, — 
"  Pacem  habere  debet  voluntas,  belluni  necessitas,  ut  liberet  Deus 
a  necessitate,  et  conservet  in  pace.  Non  enim  pax  quceritur  ut 
helium  excitetur,  sed  helium  geritur  ut  pax  acquiratur.  Esto 
ergo  etiam  hellando  pacijicus,  ut  eos  quos  expugnas,  ad  pacts 
utilitatem  vincendo  perducas^  *  The  peace  is  broken,  not  by 
the  just  war,  but  by  the  previous  injustice  which  has  rendered 
the  war  necessary.  The  war  itself  is,  necessarily,  no  more  re- 
pugnant to  the  virtue  of  peace  than  medicine  is  to  health.  The 
mission  of  our  Saviour  is  not  opposed  to  peace,  because  followed 
by  certain  evils  of  which  he  speaks,  St.  Matt.  x.  34-36,  and 
which  were  not  the  end  for  which  he  came  into  world.  The 
preaching  of  the  Gospel  is  not  inconsistent  with  the  virtue  of 
peace,  because,  through  the  depravity  and  wickedness  of  men, 
it  often  occasions  discord,  divisions,  and  even  wars ;  nor  do  they 
who  ftiithfully  preach  it  any  the  less  "  follow  after  the  things 
which  make  for  peace." 

In  asserting  that  war  is  not  necessarily  unlawful,  we  are  far 
from  pretending  that  all  wars  are  just,  or  that  war  may  ever  be 
waged  for  slight  and  trivial  offences.  The  nation  is  bound  stu- 
diously to  avoid  it,  to  forbear  till  forbearance  ceases  to  be  a  vir- 
tue, and  appeal  to  arms  only  as  the  last  resort,  after  all  other 
*  Epist.  205,  Ad  Bonifacium  Comitem. 


336  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

appeals  have  failed,  or  it  is  morally  certain  tliat  they  must  fail. 
But  when  its  rights  are  seriously  invaded,  when  the  offender 
will  not  listen  to  reason,  and  continues  his  injustice,  the  nation 
may  appeal  to  arms,  and  commit  its  cause  to  the  God  of  battles. 
The  responsibility  of  the  appeal  rests  on  the  offender  whose  in- 
justice has  provoked  it. 

It  may  be  said  that  war  is  unjustifiable,  because,  if  all  would 
practise  justice,  there  could  be  no  war.  Undoubtedly,  if  all 
men  and  nations  were  wise  and  just,  wai-s  would  cease.  We 
might  then,  in  very  deed,  "  beat  our  swords  into  ploughshares 
and  our  spears  into  pruning-hooks,"  and  learn  war  no  more. 
We  should,  not  in  vision  only,  but  in  reality,  possess  universal 
peace.  So,  if  all  individuals  understood  and  practised  the  moral 
and  Christian  virtues  in  their  perfection,  there  would  be  no  oc- 
casion for  penal  codes,  and  a  police  to  enforce  them.  If  no 
wron<Ts  or  outrages  were  committed,  there  would  be  none  to  be 
repressed  or  punished.  If  there  were  no  dise^ises,  there  would 
be  none  to  cure.  If  the  world  were  quite  another  world  than  it 
is,  it — would  be.  But  so  long  as  the  world  is  what  it  is,  so  long 
as  man  fails  to  respect  the  rights  of  man,  the  penal  code  and 
police  will  be  necessary ;  so  long  as  diseases  obtain,  the  physi- 
cian and  his  drugs,  nauseous  as  they  are,  will  be  indispensable ; 
and  so  long  as  nation  continues  to  encroach  on  nation,  the  ag- 
grieved party  will  have  the  right  and  be  compelled  to  defend 
and  avenge  itself  by  an  appeal  to  arms,  terrible  as  that  appeal 
may  be,  and  deplorable  as  may  be  the  necessity  which  de- 
mands it. 

The  evils  of  war  are  great,  but  not  the  greatest.  It  is  a 
greater  evil  to  lose  national  freedom,  to  become  the  tributaries 
or  the  slaves  of  the  foreigner,  to  see  the  sanctity  of  our  homes 
invaded,  our  altars  desecrated,  and  our  wives  and  children  made 
the  prey  of  the  ruthless  oppressor.  These  are  evils  which  do 
not  die  with  us,  but  may  descend  upon  our  posterity  through  all 
coming  generations.  The  man  who  will  look  tamely  on  and  see 
altars  and  home  defiled,  all  that  is  sacred  and  dear  wrested  from 
him,  and  his  country  stricken  from  ihe  roll  of  nations,  has  as 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  33*7 

little  reason  to  applaud  himself  for  his  morals  as  for  his  man- 
hood, No  doubt,  philanthropy  may  weep  over  the  wounded 
and  the  dying ;  but  it  is  no  great  evil  to  die.  It  is  appointed 
unto  all  men  to  die,  and,  so  far  as  the  death  itself  is  concerned, 
it  matters  not  whether  it  comes  a  few  months  earlier  or  a  few 
months  later,  on  the  battle-field  or  in  our  own  bedehambers. 
The  evil  is  not  in  dying,  but  in  dying  unprepared.  If  pre- 
pared,— and  the  soldier,  fighting  by  command  of  his  country  in 
her  cause,  may  be  prepared, — it  is  of  httle  consequence  whether 
the  death  come  in  the  shape  of  sabre-cut  or  leaden  bullet,  or  in 
that  of  disease  or  old  age.  The  tears  of  the  sentimentalist  are 
lost  upon  him  who  is  conscious  of  his  responsibilities,  that  he  is 
commanded  to  place  duty  before  death,  and  to  weigh  no  dan- 
ger against  fidelity  to  his  God  and  his  country.  Physical  pain 
is  not  worth  counting.  Accumulate  all  that  you  can  imagine, 
the  Christian  greets  it  with  joy  when  it  lies  in  the  pathway  of 
his  duty.  He  who  cannot  take  his  life  in  his  hand,  and,  pausing 
not  for  an  instant  before  the  accumulated  tortures  of  years,  rash 
in,  at  the  call  of  duty,  where  "  blows  fall  thickest,  and  blows  fall 
heaviest,"  deserves  rebuke  for  his  moral  weakness,  rather  than 
commendation  for  his  "  peaceable  dispositions." 

Wars,  w^e  have  been  told,  cost  money ;  and  we  have  among 
us  men  piquing  themselves  on  their  lofty  spiritual  views,  accus- 
ing the  age  of  being  low  and  utilitarian,  and  setting  themselves 
up  as  moral  and  religious  reformers,  who  can  sit  calmly  down  and 
cast  up  in  dollars  and  cents  the  expenses  of  war,  and  point  to 
the  amount  as  an  unanswerable  argument  against  its  lawfulness. 
War  unquestionably  costs  money,  and  so  do  food  and  clothing. 
But  the  sums  expended  in  war  would,  if  applied  to  that  pur- 
pose, found  so  many  schools  and  universities,  and  educate  so 
many  children !  The  amount  expended  for  food  and  clothing 
would  found  a  larger  number  of  schools  and  universities,  and 
educate  a  larger  number  of  children.  You  should  ask,  not. 
Will  it  cost  money  ?  but,  Is  it  necessary,  is  it  just  ?  Would  you 
weigh  gold  in  the  balance  with  duty,  justice,  patriotism,  hero- 


338  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

ism  ?     If  so,  slink  back  to  your  tribe,  and  never  aspire  to  the 
dignity  of  being-  contemptible. 

But  having  established  that  v/ar  may  be  necessary  and  just, 
the  question  comes  up,  What  is  the  duty  of  the  citizen  or  sub- 
ject, when  his  government  is  actually  engaged  in  war  ?  This  is 
a  question  of  some  moment,  especially  at  the  present  time,  when 
there  are  so  many  among  us  Avho  entertain  very  loose  notions 
of  allegiance,  and  hardly  admit  that  loyalty  is  or  can  be  a  virtue. 
We  may  answer,  in  general  terms,  that,  when  a  nation  declares 
war,  the  war  is  a  law  of  the  land,  and  binds  the  subject  to  the 
same  extent  and  for  the  same  reason  as  any  other  law  of  the 
land.  The  whole  question  is  simply  a  question  of  the  obligation 
of  the  citizen  to  obey  the  law.  So  far  as  the  subject  is  bound 
to  obey  the  law,  so  far  he  is  bound  to  render  all  the  aid  in  prose- 
cutino"  the  war  the  government  commands  him  to  render,  and  in 
the  form  in  which  it  commands  it. 

If  the  government  leaves  it  optional  with  the  citizen  whether  to 
take  an  active  part  in  the  war  or  not,  he  is  unquestionably  bound 
to  remain  passive,  if  he  believes  the  war  to  be  unjust.  Conse- 
quently, no  foreigner,  owing  no  allegiance  to  the  sovereign  mak- 
ing the  war,  can  volunteer  his  services,  if  he  entertains  any 
scruples  about  its  j\istice.  But  the  subject,  though  entertaining 
doubts  about  the  justice  of  a  given  war  in  its  incipient  stages, 
believing  his  government  too  hasty  in  its  proceedings,  and  not 
so  forbearing  as  it  might  and  should  have  been,  yet  after  the  war 
has  been  declared,  after  his  country  is  involved  in  it,  can  retreat 
only  by  suffering  grievous  wrongs,  and  seeks  now  to  advance 
only  for  the  purpose  of  securing  a  just  and  lasting  peace,  may,  no 
doubt,  even  volunteer  his  active  services,  if  he  honestly  believes 
them  to  be  necessary ;  for  the  war  now  has  changed  its  original 
character,  has  ceased  to  be  aggressive,  and  become  defensive  and 
just.  In  such  a  case,  love  of  country,  and  the  general  duty  of 
each  citizen  to  defend  his  country,  to  preserve  its  freedom  and 
independence,  override  the  scruples  he  felt  with  regard  to  the 
war  in  its  incipient  stages,  and  enable  him  to  take  part  in  it  with 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 


339 


a  safe  conscience.  But,  however  this  may  be,  it  is  clear,  that, 
when  the  government  has  actually  declared  war,  and  actually 
commands  the  services,  of  the  subject,  he  is  bound  in  conscience, 
whatever  may  be  his  private  convictions  of  the  justice  of  the  war, 
to  render  them,  on  the  ground  that  he  is  bound  in  conscience  to 
obey  the  law.  If  he  takes  part  in  obedience  to  the  command 
of  the  government,  he  takes  part,  even  though  his  private  con- 
viction is  against  the  war,  with  a  good  conscience ;  because  the 
motive  from  which  he  acts  is  not  to  prosecute  a  war  he  does  not 
regard  as  just,  but  to  obey  his  sovereign,  which  he  is  not  at 
liberty  not  to  do,  and  which  he  must  do  for  conscience'  sake. 

The  law  binds  in  conscience,  because  all  legiiimate  govern- 
ment exists  by  divine  appointment,  and  has  a  divine  I'ight  to 
make  laws.  For  the  same  reason,  then,  that  v,-e  are  bound  in 
conscience  to  obey  God,  we  are  bound  in  conscience  to  obey  the 
law.  The  sovereignty  resides  in  the  nation,  but  is  derived  from 
God.  Per  me  reges  regnant,  et  legum  conditores  justa  deccrnunt. 
"  By  me  kings  reign  and  lawgivers  decree  just  things."  Prov. 
viii.  15.  "Let  every  soul  be  subject  to  the  higher  powers  ;  for 
there  is  no  power  but  from  God  ;  and  the  powers  that  are,  are 
ordained  of  God.  Therefore  he  that  resisteth  the  power  resist- 
eth  the  ordinance  of  God,  and  they  that  resist  purchase  damna- 
tion to  themselves."  Rom.  xiii.  1,  2.  Since,  then,  the  nation  is 
sovereign  by  divine  appointment,  it  follows  necessarily,  that, 
when  the  sovereign  authority  of  the  nation  declares  war,  and 
commands  the  services  of  the  subject,  he  is  held,  on  his  alle- 
giance to  God,  who  is  the  King  of  kings  and  Sovereign  of  sover- 
eigns, to  render  them,  and  cannot  refuse  without  purchasing- 
damnation  to  himself. 

The  nation  is  not  constituted  sovereign  by  the  assent  of  the 
individuals  of  which  it  is  composed,  for  it  must  be  a  sovereign 
nation  before  individuals  have  or  can  have  the  right  of  assenting 
or  dissenting.  The  error  of  Rousseau  and  of  some  of  our  own 
politicians  is  in  assuming  that  the  sovereignty,  the  authority  to 
institute  government,  to  make  and  execute  laws,  inheres  prima- 
rily in  the  people  distributively,  as  equal,  independent  individu* 


340  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

als,  and  is  subsequently  possessed  by  the  people  collectively,  as  a 
political  organism  or  person,  by  virtue  of  the  assent  of  the  peo- 
ple taken  distributively.  The  motive  for  advocating  this  view  in 
twofold :  the  first  is,  to  make  the  basis  of  sovereignty  purely  hu- 
man ;  and  the  second,  to  take  from  actually  existing  govern- 
ments all  claims  to  inviolability,  and  thus  establish  a  sort  of 
legal  right  on  the  part  of  subjects  to  rebel  against  the  constitut- 
ed authorities,  whenever  they  judge  it  to  be  expedient.  The 
doctrine  is  the  offspring  of  an  age  disposed  to  revolt  from  both 
God  and  the  state,  and  can  be  regarded  only  with  horror  by  the 
Christian  and  the  patriot.  The  true  doctrine  is,  that  every  na- 
tion, that  is,  every  people  taken  collectively,  as  a  moral  unity,  as 
a  collective  individual,  is,  by  the  fact  that  it  is  a  nation,  sover- 
eign, and  sovereign  by  the  ordinance  of  God.  Being  thus  in- 
vested by  the  divine  will  with  the  political  sovereignty,  the  na- 
tion acting  in  its  sovereign  capacity  has,  saving  the  divine  law, 
the  right  to  institute  such  forms  of  government,  or  to  adopt  such 
methods  for  the  expression  of  its  sovereign  will,  as  it  in  its  pru- 
dence judges  best.  It  may  institute  a  monarchy,  an  aristocracy, 
or  a  pure  democracy  ;  it  may  combine  these  three  forms,  or  any 
two  of  them,  in  any  proportion  and  degree,  and  establish  such 
mixed  governments  as  it  pleases  ;  or  it  may  reject  all  these 
forms,  and,  as  with  us,  establish  representative  government,  to 
be  carried  on  through  the  medium  of  popular  election.  Which 
is  wisest  and  best  is  for  each  nation  to  decide  for  itself.  In 
point  of  fact,  we  suppose  all  are  best  where  they  fit,  and  worst 
where  they  do  not  fit.  But  however  individuals  may  speculate, 
and  whatever  preferences  as  simple  individuals  they  may  have, 
the  nation  acting  in  its  sovereign  capacity  is  the  sovereign  arbit- 
er, and  alone  decides  which  shall  be  adopted,  and  having  once 
decided,  that  form  which  it  adopts  is  legitimate,  exists  by  divine 
right,  and  its  legitimate  acts  are  law^s,  and  bind  in  the  interior  as 
well  as  in  the  exterior  court. 

This  is  as  true  of  the  actual  American  governments  as  of  any 
others.  The  American  people  were  created  by  their  colonial 
governments,  established  by  legitimate  authority,  bodies  corpo- 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  341 

rate  and  politic  subject  to  the  crown  of  Great  Britian.  But  the 
charters  granted  by  the  crown,  creating  the  colonial  govern- 
ment'?, and  reserving  the  allegiance  of  the  colonies,  expressed  or 
necessarily  implied  reciprocal  obligations.  There  was  an  express 
or  implied  contract  between  the  crown  and  the  colonies.  When 
the  crown,  on  its  part,  broke  the  contract,  as  we  alleged  it  did, 
it  forfeited  its  rights,  and  the  colonies  were  ipso  facto  absolved 
from  their  allegiance,  and  necessarily  became  ipso  facto  free  and 
independent  states  or  nations,  as  Great  Britiain  herself  subse- 
quently acknowledged  them  to  be.  As  independent  nations, 
they  possessed  by  the  ordinance  of  God,  who  makes  every 
nation,  in  that  it  is  a  nation,  sovereign,  the  right  of  self-govern- 
ment, and  were  free  to  devise  and  adopt  such  forms  of  govern- 
ment, not  repugnant  to  the  divine  law,  as  they  in  the  exercise 
of  their  sovereign  wisdom  judged  to  be  most  expedient.  They, 
in  the  exercise  of  the  right  given  them  by  Almighty  God,  es- 
tablished the  representative  form  of  government,  under  a  fed- 
eral head.  This  form  of  government,  therefore,  exists  with  us 
by  divine  right,  is  an  ordinance  of  God.  As  such  it  is  sover- 
eign and  inviolable  ;  as  such  it  has  from  God  authority  to  enact 
laws  for  the  common  good.  Then,  since  we  are  all  bound  in 
conscience  to  obey  God,  we  are  bound  to  obey  the  government, 
and  when  it  enacts  war,  just  the  same  as  when  it  enacts  any 
thing  else. 

Ignorant,  conceited,  and  unbelieving  politicians,  who  ^vould  be 
free  to  rule,  but  not  bound  to  obey,  may  affect  to  be  startled, 
whenever  there  is  speech  of  the  divine  right  of  government; 
but  we  really  say  nothing  that  militates  in  the  least  conceivable 
degree  against  popular  sovereignty.  Our  real  offence  consists,  not 
in  denying  the  popular  sovereignt}-,  but  in  asserting  for  it  a  divine 
sanction.  AVhat,  indeed,  is  it  we  say  ?  Simply,  that  the  nation, 
that  is,  the  people  as  a  moral  unity,  or  collective  individual,  as 
distinguished  fi-om  the  people  taken  distributively,  is  sovereign 
by  the  ordinance  of  God  ;  from  which  it  follows,  that  the  people 
taken  distributively  owe  allegiance  to  the  nation,  and  are  bound 
to  obey  all  the  sovereign  enactments  of  the  government,  not 


342  "WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

merely  because  it  is  human  government,  but  because  it  is  human 
government  governing  by  divine  right.     This  abridges  no  right 
of  the  sovereign  peo|)]e,  but  confirms  its  rights  by  the  highest  of 
all   i>ossible  sanctions.     It  leaves  the  nation  free  to  adopt,  if  it 
i-hooses,  a  pure  democracy,  and  commands  us,  even  though  in- 
dividually disapproving  that  form  of  government,  to  obey  it  for 
conscience'  sake.     In  a  word,  the  doctrine  we  lay  down  makes 
the  nation — that  is,  the  whole  people  taken  collectively — sover- 
eign and  inviolable,  and  the  form  of  government  it  adopts,  legit 
imate  and  sacred,  as  the  ordinance  of  God.    It  no  doubt,  therefore, 
stamps  with  the  divine  as  well  a^  the  national  displeasure  what 
bv  a  strange  perversion  is  termed  sometimes  "  the  sacred  right 
of  insurrection,"  and  utterly  condemns  all  attempts  at  rebellion 
or  resistance  to  establish  government,  in  the  legitimate  exercise 
of  its  legitimate  functions,  as  so  many  attacks  on  the  inviolability 
of  the  nation,  and  therefore  on  the  inviolability  of  God  himself, 
who  ordains   that  every  nation,  in   that  it  is  a  nation,  shall  be 
sovereign  and  inviolable.     It  can  tolerate  no  efforts  of  any  por- 
tion of  the  people  to  change  by  violence  any  established  form 
of  government  for  the  sake  of  establishing  another  form  which 
they  may  believe  to  be  more  for  the  common   good.     But  it 
leaves  individuals  peifectly  fi-ee  to  labor  through  legal  forms,  in 
an  orderly  manner,  for  the  amelioration  of  the  laws  and  institu- 
tions of  the  country,  and  the  nation  itself,  Avhen  acting  in   its 
sovereign  capacity,  as  we  did  at  the  epoch  of  what  we  call  our 
Revolution,  or  as  we  do  through  the   legal  conventions  of  the 
people,  to  change  even  the  form  of  the  government,  and  to  or- 
dain such  new  methods  for  the  expression  of  its  sovereign  will 
as  it  may  believe  to  be  most  for  the  common  good.*     It  leaves 
the  people  as  the  commonwealth  and  the  people  as  individuals 
all  the  freedom  there  is  this  side  of  license,  and  for])ids  nothing 
that  is  compatible  with  national  sovereignty  and  inviolability. 
It  can  be  objected  to,  then,  by  none  who  are  not  prepared  to 
object  to  all  government,  all  law,  and  all  order. 

*See  St.  Th.,  Sunwia,  1.  2,  Q.  97,  a.  1,  and  St.  Aug.,  JDe  Libera 
Ayhitrio,  I.,  c.  6. 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  343 

The  duty  of  obedience  to  law  is  precisely  the  same  under  a 
republican  government  as  under  any  other  form  of  government. 
For  though  the  people  make  the  law,  yet  it  is  not  in  the  same 
sense  as  that  in  which  they  are  held  to  obey  it.  They  make 
the  law  in  their  collective  sense,  as  a  moral  unity,  or  public 
pei'son ;  they  are  held  to  obey  in  their  distributive  capacity,  as 
simple  individuals.  In  their  quality  of  electors,  acting  through 
legal  forms  prescribed  by  sovereign  authority,  the  people  with 
us  make  the  law,  but  it  is  only  when  so  acting  that  they  nuike 
it,  have  any  voice  in  making  it,  or  incur  any  responsibility,  be 
the  law  what  it  may.  As  individuals  acting  in  any  other  capac- 
itv,  they  are  subjects,  and  in  the  same  sense  and  to  the  same 
extent  as  they  would  be  in  case  they  enjoyed  no  elective  fran- 
chise at  all.  The  law  is  as  imperative  with  us  as  it  is  under 
any  other  form  of  government,  and  can  no  more  be  resisted 
with  a  safe  conscience  than  elsewhere. 

This  assumed,  the  individual  in  his  quality  of  subject  stands 
here  in  relation  to  the  law  precisely  as  he  does  in  those  coun- 
tries where  there  is  no  elective  franchise.  Tie  incui-s,  indeed, 
as  elector,  a  responsibility  for  the  law,  and  cannot  be  exempted 
from  blame,  if  he  have  not  done  all  in  his  power  to  make  the 
law  just  and  useful ;  but  when  the  proper  authorities  have  en- 
acted and  promulgated  the  law,  he  in  his  quality  of  subject 
incurs  no  responsibility  by  obeying  it,  in  consequence  of  his  re- 
sponsibility as  an  elector  in  making  it.  The  act  of  making  the 
law  was  not  his  individual  act,  and  he  is  responsible  for  it,  pro- 
viding he  acted  with  proper  motives,  only  so  fer  as  he  went  to 
make  up  the  collective  unity  that  enacted  it.  But  the  act  of 
obedience  or  of  disobedience  is  purely  his  individual  act,  and  is 
unaftected,  as  obedience  or  disobedience,  by  any  act  of  his  per- 
formed in  another  capacity,  in  which  he  acts  not  as  an  individ- 
ual, but  as  a  part  of  a  whole.  Suppose,  then,  I  look  upon  the 
war  declared  by  my  government  as  unjust  or  uncalled  for.  This 
may  be  a  good  reason  why  I  should  exert  myself  in  my  quality 
of  elector  to  get  the  law^  declaring  it  repealed,  but  it  leaves  me 
in  my  quality  of  subject  precisely  where  T  should  be  in  case  I 


344  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

had  no  elective  franchise.  I  am  just  as  much  bound  to  obey 
the  law  declaring  the  war,  and  incur  no  more  blame  for  aiding 
in  prosecuting  it.  The  citizen,  when  he  believes  a  law  unjust, 
is  doubtless  bound  as  an  elector  to  seek  its  repeal ;  but  till  re- 
pealed, he  is  as  much  bound  to  obey  as  he  would  be  if  he  were 
no  elector,  and  only  a  simple  subject ;  and  being  so  bound,  in- 
curs no  blame  in  obeying  it,  that  he  would  not  then  also  incur. 

But  is  there  no  limit  to  this  obedience  to  law?  Have  I  not 
the  right  to  judge  the  acts  of  authority,  and  decide  for  myself 
whether  they  are  such  as  I  ought  or  ought  not  to  obey  ?  That 
is.  Does  or  does  not  the  law  depend  on  the  assent  of  the  govern- 
ed for  its  validity  ?  It  is  a  sort  of  maxim  with  us  Americans, 
that  no  man  can  be  justly  held  to  obey  a  law  to  which  he  has 
not  assented.  This,  taken  absolutely,  is  not  admissible.  The  sov- 
ereign authority  resides  in  the  people  as  a  whole,  taken  collec- 
tively, not  in  the  people  distributively,  and  is  derived  not  from 
the  people  as  individuals,  as  Rousseau  dreamed,  but  from  God, 
as  we  have  before  proved  from  the  Holy  Scriptures.  Moreover, 
to  make  the  law  depend  on  the  assent  of  the  governed,  that  is, 
on  the  assent  of  the  subject,  is  to  deny  that  the  law  is  law,  that 
the  subject  is  a  subject,  and  to  assert  that  one  is  bound  by  no 
law,  but  free  to  do  as  he  pleases.  There  can  be  no  legitimate 
government  unless  it  have  the  right  to  govern,  and  there  can 
be  no  right  to  govern  where  there  is  not  a  correlative  obligation 
to  obey.  If  the  law  cannot  bind  the  subject  till  he  gives  his 
assent,  and  he  is  free  to  give  or  withhold  his  assent,  he  is,  and 
can  be,  under  no  obligation  to  obey  unless  he  chooses,  and  then 
there  is  no  right  on  the  part  of  the  government  to  enforce  obe- 
dience; then  no  right  to  govern;  and  then  no  government. 
To  make  the  law  depend  for  its  validity  on  the  assent  of  the 
governed  is,  then,  the  denial  of  all  government.  But  govern- 
ment exists  by  divine  right.  It  has  from  God  the  right  to  com- 
mand. Then  it  is  not  under  the  necessity  of  entreating  or  re- 
questing the  subject  to  be  so  complacent  as  to  obey.  The  law, 
then,  is  complete,  the  moment  it  is  enacted  and  promulgated 
by  the  proper  authority.     If  the  law  is  then  complete,  the  sub- 


WVR    AND    LOYALTY.  345 

ject  has  no  assent  to  o-ive  or  withhold,  no  judgment  to  form,  no 
decision  to  take,  but  that  to  obey. 

Nevertheless,  there  is  a  sense,  in  this  country,  and  perhaps  in 
all  countries,  in  which  it  is  true  that  the  assent  of  the  governed 
is  essential  to  the  validity  of  the  law  ;  but  this  is  the  assent  they 
give  in  their  quality  of  electors,  through  the  medium  of  their 
representatives  in  enacting  the  law,  not  an  assent  which  they 
give  as  subjects  to  the  law  after  it  is  enacted  and  promulgated. 
The  distinction  is  obvious  and  important.  It  is  only  in  our 
quality  of  electors,  through  the  medium  of  our  representatives, 
that  we  have  any  legislative  authority,  any  assent,  to  give  or  to 
withhold.  But  in  this  quality  we  have  already  assented  to  the 
law,  otherwise  it  could  not  have  been  enacted,  since  there  is  no 
power  with  us  but  the  people  in  this  quality  and  through  this 
medium  that  doe.s  or  can  make  the  law.  Ha\ing  thus  assented, 
nay,  enacted  the  law,  we  have  no  more  assent  to  give,  and  it 
would  be  absurd  to  seek,  after  this,  the  assent  of  the  people  in 
their  capacity  of  simple  individuals,  in  which  they  are  simply 
subjects,  and  have  no  legislative  voice  whatever.  Having  spok- 
en once  in  our  legislative  capacity,  as  electors,  through  our  rep- 
resentatives,, we  must  obey,  till,  by  speaking  again  in  the  same 
capacity  and  through  the  same  medium,  we  repeal  the  law. 
That  is,  when  the  people  have  made  the  law,  they  must  obey 
it,  till  they,  through  the  forms  through  which  they  made  it, 
repeal  it. 

But  laws  may  undoubtedly  be  unjust.  Am  I  bound  to  obey 
unjust  laws  ?  We  wall  let  St.  Thomas  answ^er  this  question  for 
us.  "  Laws  imposed  by  human  authority  may  be  either  just  or 
unjust.  K  they  are  indeed  just,  they  bind  in  conscience,  by  the 
eternal  law  from  which  they  are  derived,  according  to  Prov.  viii. 
15, — '  Per  me  reges  regnant,  et  legum  conditores  justa  decernunt^ 
They  are  just  when  they  ordain  what  is  for  the  common  good, 
when  enacted  by  an  authority  which  does  not  exceed  its  powers, 
and  when  they  distribute  in  equal  proportions  the  burdens  they 
impose  upon  the  subjects  for  the  common  good.  For,  since  each 
man  is  a  part  of  the  multitude,  every  man  belongs  to  the  multi' 


346  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

tnde  in  that  which  he  is  and  in  that  which  he  has,  in  hke  man- 
ner as  the  part  belongs  in  what  it  is  to  the  whole,  and  hence 
nature  allows  a  certain  detriment  to  the  part  that  the  whole  may 
be  saved.  Consequently,  laws  of  tliis  kind,  which  proportion 
equally  the  burdens  imposed,  are  just,  bind  in  conscience,  and 
are  legal  laws.  But  laws  may  be  unjust  in  two  senses.  1.  By 
contrariety  to  human  good,  in  the  respects  just  mentioned. 
They  are  unjust,  when  a  prince  imposes  burdens  on  his  subjects, 
not  for  the  common  good,  but  rather  for  his  own  glory  or  cu- 
pidity, when  they  exceed  the  commission  or  the  authority  which 
ordains  them,  and  when  the  burdens  they  impose,  even  though 
for  the  common  good,  are  not  equally  proportioned.  Such  acts 
are  violences  rather  than  laws,  a.s  St.  Augustine  says,  De  Lib. 
Arh.,  L,  c.  5. — '  Lex  esse  non  videtiw,  quce  justa  non  fuerit.^ 
Laws  of  this  kind  do  not  bind  in  conscience,  unless,  perchance, 
for  the  avoiding  of  scandal  or  disorder,  for  which  a  man  must 
forego  his  own  rights,  according  to  St.  Matt.  v.  40,  41, — '  Qui 
angariaverit  te  mille  passus,  vade  cum  eo  alia  duo  ;  et  qui  ab- 
stulerit  tibi  tunicam^  da  ei  et  pallium.^  2.  Laws  may  be  unjust 
by  contrariety  to  divine  good,  as  the  edicts  of  tyrants  command- 
ing idolatry  or  other  things  forbidden  by  the  divine  law.  Such 
laws  are  to  be  observed  in  no  sense  whatever,  since,  Acts  iv.,  it 
is  necessary  to  obey  God  rather  than  men."  * 

The  principle  is,  that  all  just  laws  bind  in  conscience  ;  but, 
Avith  regard  to  unjust  laws,  we  must  distinguish  between  those 
which  are  unjust  because  they  ordain  what  is  repugnant  to  hu- 
man good,  and  those  which  are  unjust  because  they  ordain  what 
is  repugnant  to  the  divine  law.  The  latter  do  not  bind,  but  we 
are  bound  in  conscience  to  refuse  to  obey  them  at  all  hazards ; 
the  former,  when  they  only  require  us  to  suffer  wrong, — and  if 
they  go  farther  and  command  us  to  do  wrong,  they  are  identical 
with  the  latter, — we  may  obey,  and  are  bound  to  obey,  when 
our  disobedience  would  cause  scandal  or  breed  disturbance  in 
the  state. 

But  who  is  to  determine  whether  the  laws  are  just  or  unjust? 

*   Sunima,  1    9,  Ques.  96,  a.  4. 


WAR    AND    LOYALTY.  34*7 

Not  absolutely  in  all  cases  the  state,  for  that  would  make  the 
distinction  between  just  and  unjust  laws  nugatory,  since  the 
state,  in  enacting  a  law,  decides  that  it  is  just ;  not  the  individ- 
ual, for  that  would  make  the  law  depend  on  the  assent  of  the 
subject  for  its  legality,  which  we  have  seen  is  not  the  fact,  and 
cannot  be  the  fact,  if  we  are  to  have  government  at  all.  There 
is  here,  to  many  minds,  no  doubt,  a  serious  difficulty  ;  but,  with- 
out considering  it  in  a  liglit  which  would  involve  a  controversy 
foreign  to  our  present  purpose,  we  may  answer  the  question  by 
laying  down  the  principle,  that  authority  is  always  presumjjtiv^ 
in  the  right,  and  the  law  prima  facie  evidence  of  justice.  The 
onus  prohandi  rests  on  the  shoulders  of  the  subject,  who  must 
prove  the  law  to  be  unjust,  before  he  can  have  the  right  to  re- 
fuse it  obedience.  For  this  his  own  private  judgment  or  con- 
viction can  never  suffice.  If  he  can  allege  nothing  against  the 
law  but  his  own  individual  persuasion  of  its  injustice,  he  is 
bound,  by  his  general  obligation  to  obey  the  laws,  to  obey  it. 
No  one,  then,  can  ever  be  justified  in  disobeying  on  his  own  pri- 
vate authority.  He  must  sustain  his  refusal  to  obey  by  an  au- 
thority higher  than  his  own,  higher  than  that  of  the  state,  or 
else  he  will  be  guilty  of  resisting  the  ordinance  of  God,  and, 
therefore,  purchase  damnation  to  himself  Hence,  w^here  there 
is  no  infallible  authority  to  decide,  the  subject  must  always  pre- 
sume the  law  to  be  just,  and  faithfully  obey  it,  unless  it  mani- 
festly and  undeniably  ordains  what  is  wi'ong  in  itself,  and  pro- 
hibited by  the  law  of  God. 

This  rule  may  strike  some  as  too  stringent,  but,  if  examined, 
closely,  it  will  be  found  to  allow  all  the  liberty  to  the  subject 
compatible  with  the  existence  of  government.  If,  for  instance, 
the  government  should  command  me  to  lie,  to  steal,  to  rob,  to 
bear  false  witness,  or  any  thing  else  manifestly  against  the  law 
of  nature  or  the  law  of  God,  I  should  hold  myself  bound  to 
disobey,  and  to  take  the  consequences  of  my  disobedience.  So, 
also,  if  my  government  should  declare  war  against  an  unoffend- 
ing state,  manifestly  for  the  purpose  of  stripping  it  of  its  ter- 
ritoiy,  destroying  its  independence,  and  reducing  its  people  to 


348  WAR    AND    LOYALTY. 

slavery,  or  for  the  purpose  of  overthrowing  the  Christian  religion 
and  substituting  a  false  religion,  and  should  command  me  to 
aid  it  in  its  nefarious  designs,  I  should  hold  myself  bound  in 
conscience  to  refuse  at  all  hazards;  for  such  a  war  would  be 
manifestly  and  palpably  unjust,  not  in  my  judgment  only,  but 
in  that  of  all  sound-minded  men.  Such  a  case  would  be  clear, 
and  duty  would  be  so  plain  that  no  question  could  arise.  But 
in  a  case  less  clear  and  manifest,  in  a  case  where  there  was 
room  for  doubt,  for  an  honest  difference  of  opinion,  I  should 
^0t  myself  bound  to  obey  the  orders  of  the  government,  for 
conscience'  sake,  leaving  the  responsibility  with  it,  sure  of  in- 
cui-ring  no  blame  myself. 

In  conclusion,  we  say,  that,  though  we  have  defended  the 
lawfulness  of  war,  when  declared  by  the  sovereign  authority,  for 
a  just  cause,  and  prosecuted  with  right  intentions,  we  have  no 
sympathy  with  that  restless  and  ambitious  spirit  that  craves  war 
for  the  sake  of  excitement  or  glory.  Only  a  stern  Lecessity  can 
ever  justify  the  resort  to  arms,  and  that  necessity  does  not  in 
reality  often  exist.  In  most  cases,  the  war,  with  a  little  pru- 
dence, a  little  forbearance,  a  little  use  of  reason,  might  be  avoid- 
ed ;  and  a  terrible  responsibility  rests  upon  rulers  when  they 
unnecessarily  plunge  two  nations  in  the  horrors  of  war.  Yet  it 
belongs  to  the  sovereign  authority  to  jvidge  of  the  necessity  of 
the  war,  no  less  than  to  declare  it ;  and  when  not  manifestly 
and  undeniably  for  that  which  is  wrong  in  itself,  the  subject  is 
bound  to  obey,  and  give  his  life,  if  need  be,  for  his  country. 
But  the  subject  can,  with  a  good  conscience,  fight  only  under 
the  national  banner.  He  can  never  justly  fight  under  the  blood- 
red  flag  of  the  factionist  or  of  the  revolutionist.  The  loyal 
subject  hears  no  call  to  the  battle-field  but  that  of  his  sovereign. 
This  sovereign  he  hears,  by  him  he  stands,  for  him  he  is  ready 
to  fight  against  any  enemies,  from  within  or  from  without.  But 
there  he  stops.  He  can  join  with  no  faction,  with  no  party, 
against  the  legitimate  authoi'ities  of  his  country.  No  dreams 
of  free  institutions,  of  popular  government,  of  an  earthly  para- 
dise can  make  him  raise  the  parricidal  hand,  and  seek  by  vio- 


THE    HIGHER    LAW.  349 

lence  to  overthrow  legitimate  government,  and  mtrodnce  a  new 
political  order.  No,  dearly  as  we  love  liberal  institutions,  and 
as  ready  as  we  are  to  spill  our  blood  in  their  defense  where 
they  are  the  legal  order,  we  would  rush  to  the  side  of  authority, 
and  spill  the  same  blood  against  them,  if  there  were  an  attempt 
by  violence  to  mtroduce  them.  True  freedom  is  only  where  the 
law  is  supreme,  and  the  law  is  supreme  only  where  the  people 
reverence  it,  and  feel  themselves  bound  by  their  duty  to  God  to^ 
obey  it. 


THE  HIGHER   LAW.^ 

JANUARY,    1851. 


Professor  Stuart  appears  to  have  written  this  pamphlet 
from  patriotic  motives,  with  an  earnest  desire  to  allay  the  uncall- 
ed for  popular  agitation  on  the  subject  of  negro  slavery,  and  to 
contribute  his  share  towards  the  maintenance  of  domestic  peace, 
and  the  preservation  of  the  Union.  His  chief  purpose  appears 
to  have  been  to  remove  the  scruples  of  some  of  his  friends,  by 
showing  that  a  man  may  with  a  good  conscience  support  the  Fed- 
eral Constitution  although  it  recognizes  slavery,  and  requires  the 
slave  escaping  into  a  non-slaveholding  State  to  be  given  up  on 
the  demand  of  his  owner ;  and  though  he  is  no  great  proficient 
in  moral  theology,  and  his  style  is  prolix,  prosy,  and  at  times 
even  garrulous,  he  has  shown  this  to  the  satisfaction  of  all  but 
mere  factionists  and  cavillers. 

We  do  not  think  that  the  learned  Professor  has  made  out  his 
case  as  conclusively  as  he  might  have  done.  He  is  a  man  of 
respectable  ability  and  attainments,  bnt  not  remarkable  for  the 
strength  or  acutness  of  his  logical  powers.     He  makes  now  and 

*  Conscience  and  the  Constitution,  with  Remarks  on  the  recent 
Speech  of  the  Hon.  Daniel  Webster  in  the  Senate  of  the  United  States 
on  the  Subject  of  Slavery.  By  Moses  Stuart.  Boston  :  Crocker  & 
Brewster.     1S50.     8vo.     pp.  119. 


^^^vil,  and  exe^ 


350  THE    HIGHER    LAW. 

tliGTi  a  slip,  of  ^Yhicll  an  uncanclid  critic  might  take  advantage. 
He  is  strongly  opposed  to  slavery,  but  wishes  at  the  same  time 
to  prove  that  the  Christian  may  with  a  good  conscience  be  a 
slave-holder.  In  order  to  prove  this,  he  asserts  and  proves  that 
slavery  is  not  malum  in  se,  and  therefore,  if  a  sin  at  all,  it  is  so 
only  accidentally.  But  in  order  to  justify  his  sincere  aversion 
to  slavery,  he  maintains  that  it  is  always  and  everywhere  an 
il,  and  execuses  the  old  patriarchs  for  holding  slaves  only  on 
of  invincible  ignorance !  In  the  darkness  of  those 
fien  knew  and  could  know  no  better  !  This  we  need 
^^^^pywi&^i  contradiction  to  his  assertion  that  slavery  is  not 
malum  in  se.  But  passing  over  slips  of  this  sort, — somewhat 
common  in  all  Professor  Stuart's  writings  that  have  fallen  under 
our  notice, — and  looking  only  to  the  main  design  and  argument 
of  the  pamphlet,  we  can  very  cheerfully  commend  it  to  our 
Protestant  readers. 

For  ourselves,  we  agree  with  Professor  Stuart  that  slavery  is 
not  malum  in  se.  We  hold  that  in  some  cases  at  least  slavery- 
is  justifiable,  and  to  the  slave  even  a  blessing.  To  the  slave  it 
is  always  good  or  evil  according  as  he  wills  it  to  be  one  or  the 
other,  or  according  to  the  spirit  with  which  he  bears  it.  If  he 
regards  it  as  a  penance,  and  submits  to  it  in  a  true  penitential 
spirit,  it  is  a  blessing  to  him,  a  great  mercy, — as  are  on  the  same 
condition  to  every  one  of  us  all  the  sufferings  and  afflictions  of 
this  life.  We  should  covet  in  this  world,  not  happiness,  but 
suffering,  and  the  more  grievous  our  afflictions,  the  more  should 
we  rejoice  and  give  thanks.  Christianity  does  not  teach  carnal 
Judaism,  but  condemns  it,  and  commands  its  opposite  as  the 
condition  of  all  real  good,  whether  for  this  world  or  for  that 
which  is  to  come.  To  the  master,  slavery  is  not  an  evil,  when 
he  does  not  abuse  it ;  when  he  has  not  himself  participated  in 
reducing  those  born  free  to  servitude ;  when  he  treats  his  slaves 
with  kindness  and  humanity,  and  faithfully  watches  over  their 
moral  and  religious  well-being.  The  refation  of  master  and 
man,  as  to  the  authority  of  the  former  and  the  subjection  of  the 
latter,  differs  in  nothing  from  the  relation  of  father  and  son 


THE    HIGHER    LAW.  351 

while  the  son  is  under  age,  and  there  is  nothing  which  necessa- 
rily makes  the  relation  less  advantageous  to  either  party  in  the 
one  case  than  in  the  other. 

That  slavery  as  it  exists  in  our  Southern  States  is  an  evil,  we 
do  not  doubt ;  but  it  is  so  accidentally,  not  necessaril3\  The 
evil  is  not  in  the  relation  of  slavery  itself,  but  in  the  ftict  that 
the  great  body  of  the  masters  do  not  bring  up  their  slaves  in 
the  Church  of  God,  and  train  or  suffer  them  to  be  trained  to  obi 
serve  the  precepts  of  the  Divine  law.  The  mass  of  the  ^ 
in  this  country  grow  up  in  heresy  or  heathenism,  to  th 
ing  destruction  of  their  souls.  Here  is  the  evil  we  s( 
plore, — an  evil,  however,  which  none  but  Catholics  do^r  calT 
feel  with  much  vividness.  It  is  an  evil  which  does  not  and  can- 
not weigh  much  with  Protestants,  for  the  slaves  in  general  are 
as  little  heathen  and  fully  as  orthodox  as  their  masters.  If  the 
masters  were  good  Catholics,  as  they  ought  to  be,  and  are  under 
the  condemnation  of  God  for  not  being,  and  brought  up,  as  they 
are  bound  to  do,  their  slaves  in  the  belief  and  practice  of  the 
Catholic  rehgion,  there  would  be  no  evil  in  negro  slavery  to  dis" 
turb  us.  The  only  evils  we  see  in  it  are  moral  and  spiritual, 
inseparable  from  heresy  and  heathenism.  The  physical  and 
sentimental  evils,  or  pretended  evils,  about  which  Abolitionists 
and  philanthropists  keep  up  such  a  clamor  do  not  move  us  in 
the  least.  We  place  not  the  slightest  value  on  what  the  men 
of  this  woild  call  liberty,  and  we  are  taught  by  religion  that 
poverty  and  suffering  are  far  more  enviable  than  riches  and  sen- 
sual enjoyment. 

But  conceding  the  evil  of  slavery  as  it  exists  in  this  country, 
it  is  far  from  certain  that  it  is  an  evil  that  would  be  mitigated 
by  emancipation,  or  that  emancipation  would  not  be  even  a 
greater  evil.  The  negroes  are  here,  and  here  they  must  remain. 
This  is  a  "  fixed  fact."  Taking  the  American  people  as  they 
are,  and  as  they  are  likely  to  be  for  some  time  to  come,  with 
their  pride,  prejudices,  devotion  to  material  interests,  and  hatred 
or  disregard  of  Christian  truth  and  morals,  it  is  clear  to  us  that 
the  condition  of  the  negro  as  a  slave  is  even  less  evil  than  would 


.  they  are  ps 


352  THE    HKiHER    LAW. 

be  his  conditiou  as  a  freedman.     The  freed  negroes  amongst  iis 
are  as  a  body,  to  say  the  least,  no  less  immoral  and  heathen  than 
the  slaves  themseh'es.      They   are  the  pests   of  our  Northern 
cities,  especially  since  they  have  come  under  the  protection  of 
our  philanthropists.     With   a  few   honorable  exceptions,   they 
are  low  and  degraded,  steeped  in  vice  and    overflowing  with 
critne.     Even  in  our  own  city,  almost  at  the  moment  we  write, 
they  are  parading  our  streets  in  armed  bands,  for  the  avowed 
)ose  of  resisting  the  execution  of  the  laws.     Let  loose  some 
;ee  millions  like  them,  and  there  would  be  no  living  in 
an  community.     Give  them  freedom  and  the  right  to 
ur  elections,  and  the  whole  country  would  be  at  the 
mercy  of  the  lowest  and  most  worthless  of  our  demagogues. 
With  only  Protestantism,  indififerentism,    infidelity,  or  savage 
fanaticism  to  restrain  them,  all  their  base  and  disorderly  passions 
would  be  unchained,  and  our  community  would  be  a  hell  upon 
earth.     No;  before  we  talk  of  emancipation,  befoiewe  can  ven- 
ture upon  it  with  the  least  conceivable  advantage  to  the  slaves, 
we  must  train  them,  and  train  the  white  American  people  also, 
to  habits  of  self-denial  and  moral  nrtue  under  the  regimen  of 
the  Catholic  Church,  which  alone  has  power  to  subdue  the  bar- 
barous elements  of  our  nature,  and  to  enable  men  of  widely 
different  races,  complexions,  and  characteristics  to  live  together 
in  the  bonds  of  peace  and  brotherhood.     We  cannot,  therefore, 
agree  with  Professor  Stuart  in  his  demand  for  emancipation,  and 
we  are  decidedly  opposed,  for  the  present  at  least,  not  only  to 
the  fanatical  proceedings  set  on  foot  by  our  miserable  Abolition- 
ists and  philanthropists  to  effect  emancipation,  but  to  emancipa- 
tion itself.     In  the  present  state  of  things,  emancipation  would 
be  a  greater  evil  than  slavery,  and  of  two  evils  we  are  bound  to 
choose  the  least.     We  have  heard  enough  of  liberty  and  the 
rights  of  man ;  it  is  high  time  to  hear  something  of  the  duties  of 
men  and  the  rights  of  authority. 

We  write  very  deliberately,  and  are  prepared  for  all  the  oblo- 
quy which  may  be  showered  upon  us  for  what  we  write.  The 
cry  of  liberty  has  gone  forth  ;  we,  as  well  as  others,  have  heard 


THE    HIGHER    LAW.  353 

it ;  it  has  gone  forth  and  been  echoed  and  reechoed  from  every 
quarter,  till  the  world  has  become   maddened  with  it.      The 
voice  of  law,  of  order,  of  wisdom,  of  justice,  of  truth,  of  expe- 
rience, of  common  sense,  is  drowned  in  the  tumultuous  shouts 
of  Liberty,  Equality,  Fraternity  ! — shouts  fit,  in  the  sense  they 
are  uttered,  only  for  assembled  demons  declaring  v.ar  upon  the 
Eternal  God.     But  this  should  be  our  shame,  not  our  boast. 
It  ought  not  to  be,  and,  if  the  world  is  to  continue,  must  soon 
cease  to  be.     Society  cannot  subsist  where  the  rights  of  author-  ' 
ity  are    forgotten,    and   loyalty   and   obedience  are  foresworn. 
There  is  no  use  in  multiplying  w^ords  on  the  subject.     Man  is  a 
social  being,  and  cannot  hve  without  society  ;  society  is  n!q:)rac- 
ticable  and  inconceivable  without  government ;  and  government 
is  impossible  where  its  right  to  command  is  denied,  or  the  obli- 
gation to  obey  it  is  not  recognized.     It  is  of  the  essence  of  gov- 
ernment to  restrain,  and  a  government  that  imposes  no  restraint, 
that  leaves  every  one  free  to  do  whatever  seemeth  right  in  his 
own  eyes,  is  no  government  at  all.     The  fii*st  want  of  every  peo- 
ple is  strong  and  efficient  government, — a  regularly  constituted 
authority,  that  has  the  right  and  the  power  to  enforce  submis- 
sion to  its  will.     No  matter  what  the  form  of  your  government, 
no  matter  in  whose  hands  the  power  is  lodged, — in  the  hands 
of  the  king,  of  the  lords,  or  the  commons, — it  must,  in  so  far  as 
government  at  all,  be  sovereign,  clothed,  under  God,  with  su- 
preme authority,  and  be  respected  as  such,  or  society  is  only  Bed- 
lam without  its  keeper. 

This  is  the  great  truth  the  American  people,  in  their  insane 
clamor  about  the  lights  of  man  and  the  largest  liberty,  that  is 
to  say,  full  license  to  every  man,  lose  sight  of,  or  in  reality  deny ; 
and  it  is  on  this  truth,  not  on  liberty,  for  which  all  are  crying 
out,  that  it  is  necessary  now  to  insist,  both  in  season  and  out  of 
season.  There  may  be  times  and  countries  when  and  where 
the  true  servants  of  God  must  seek  to  restrict  the  action  of  gov- 
ernment, and  lessen  the  prerogatives  of  power ;  but  assuredly 
here  and  now  our  duty  is  not  to  clamor  for  liberty  or  emanci- 
pation, but  to  reassert  the  rights  of  authority  and  the  majesty 


354  THE    HIGHER    LAW. 

of  law.  Yon  will  be  decried,  if  you  do  so.  No  doubt  of  it. 
But  what  then  ?  When  was  it  popular  to  insist  on  the  special 
truth  demanded  by  one's  own  age  ?  When  wjis  it  that  one 
could  really  serve  his  age  or  country  without  falling  under  its 
condemnation  ?  W^hen  was  it  that  the  multitude  were  known 
to  applaud  him  who  rebuked  them  for  their  errors,  exposed  to 
them  the  dangers  into  which  they  were  running  by  following 
their  dominant  tendencies,  and  presented  them  the  truth  needed 
for  their  salvation  ?  What  great  or  good  man  ever  proposed  to 
himself  to  serve  his  fellow-men  by  following  their  instincts,  flat- 
terino^lieir  prejudices,  and  inflaming  their  passions  ?  Who 
knows  not  that  ei-ror  and  sin  come  by  nature,  and  that  virture  is 
achieved  only  by  effort,  by  violence,  by  heroic  struggle  against 
even  ourselves  ?  Is  not  the  hero  always  a  soldier  ?  Let  then, 
the  multitude  clamor,  let  the  age  denounce,  let  the  wicked  rage, 
let  earth  and  hell  do  their  worst,  what  care  you,  heroic  soldier 
of  tlie  King  of  kings  ?  Go  forth  and  meet  the  enemy.  Charge, 
and  charge  home,  where  your  Immortal  Leader  gives  the  word, 
and  leave  the  responsibility  to  him.  If  you  fall,  so  much  the 
greater  glory  for  you,  so  much  the  more  certain  your  victory, 
and  your  triumph. 

But  we  are  straying  from  the  point  we  had  in  mind  when  we 
set  out.  Our  purpose  was,  to  offer  some  remarks  on  what  is 
termed  "  the  higher  law  "  to  which  the  opponents  of  the  recent 
Fugitive  Slave  Law  appeal  to  justify  their  refusal  to  execute  it. 
The  Hon.  Mr.  Seward,  one  of  the  Senators  from  New  York,  in 
the  debate  in  the  Senate  during  the  last  session  of  Congress  on 
the  Fugitive  Slave  Bill,  refused  to  vote  for  the  measure,  although 
necessary  to  cany  out  an  express  constitutional  provision,  on  the 
ground  that  to  give  up  a  fugitive  slave  is  contrary  to  the  law 
of  God ;  and  the  Abolitionists  and  Free  Soilers  refuse  to  execute 
the  law,  and  even  in  some  instances  resist  its  execution,  on  the 
same  ground.  When  the  honorable  Senator  appealed  from  the 
Constitution  to  the  law  of  God,  as  a  higher  law,  he  was  told  by 
the  advocates  of  the  bill,  that,  having  just  taken  his  oath  to 
support  the  Constitution,  he   had  debarred  himself  from  the 


THE    HIGHER    LAW.  355 

right,  while  retaining  liis  seat  in  the  Senate,  to  appeal  from  it 
to  any  law  requiring  him  to  act  in  contravention  of  its  provi- 
sions. The  Abolitionists  and  Free  Soilers  imtnediately  conclud- 
ed from  this  that  the  advocates  of  the  bill  denied  the  reality  of 
any  law  higher  than  the  Constitution,  and  their  papers  and 
periodicals  teem  with  aiticles  and  essays  to  prove  the  supremacy 
of  the  law  of  God.  The  question  is  one  of  no  littlfe  gravity,  and, 
to  our  Protestant  friends,  of  no  little  perplexity.  We  may,  there- 
fore, be  allowed  to  devote  a  few  pages  to  its  consideration. 

We  ao-ree  entirelv  with  Mr.  Seward  and  his  Abolition  and 
Free  Soil  friends,  as  to  the  fact  that  there  is  a  higher  law  than 
the  Constitution.  The  law;  of  God  is  supreme,  and  overrides  all 
human  enactments,  and  every  human  enactment  incompatible 
with  it  is  null  and  void  from  the  beginning,  and  cannot  be  obeyed 
with  a  good  conscience,  for  "  we  must  obey  God  rather  than  men." 
This  is  the  great  truth  statesmen  and  lawyers  are  extremely 
prone  to  overlook,  which  the  temporal  authority  not  seldom 
practically  denies,  and  on  which'  the  Church  never  fails  to  insist. 
Tliis  truth  is  so  fi-equently  denied,  so  frequently  outraged,  that 
we  aie  glad  to  find  it  asserted  by  Mr.  Seward  and  his  friends, 
although  they  assert  it  in  a  case  and  for  a  purpose  in  which  we 
do  not  and  cannot  sympathize  with  them. 

But  the  concession  of  the  fact  of  a  higher  law  than  the  Con- 
stitution does  not  of  itself  justify  the  appeal  to  it  against  the 
Constitution,  either  by  Mr.  Seward  or  the  opponents  of  the 
Fugitive  Slave  Law.  Mr.  Seward  had  no  right,  while  holding 
his  seat  in  the  Senate  under  the  Constitution,  to  appeal  to  this 
hicrher  law  ao-ainst  the  Constitution,  because  that  was  to  deny 
the  very  authority  by  which  he  held  his  seat.  The  Constitu- 
tion, if  repugnant  to  the  law  of  God,  is  null  and  void,  is  without 
authority,  and  as  Mr.  Seward  held  his  seat  by  virtue  of  its  au- 
thority, he  could  have  no  authority  for  holding  his  seat,  after 
having  declared  it  to  be  null  and  void,  because  the  Constitution 
is  a  mere  compact,  and  the  Federal  Government  has  no  existence 
independent  of  it,  or  powers  not  created  by  it.  This  is  an  in- 
convenience he  does  not  appear  to  have  considered.     The  prin- 


356  THE    HIGHER    LAW. 

ciple  that  would  have  justified  his  refusal  to  obey  the  Constitu- 
tion would  have  deprived  him  of  his  seat  as  a  Senator.  More- 
over, the  question  of  the  compatibility  or  incompatibility  of  the 
Constitution  with  the  law  of  God  was  a  question  for  him  to  have 
raised  and  settled  before  taking  his  senatorial  oath.  Could  he 
conscientiously  swear  to  support  the  Constitution  ?  If  he  could, 
he  could  not  afterwards  refuse  to  carry  out  any  of  its  imperative 
provisions,  on  the  gi'ound  of  its  being  contrary  to  the  higher  law ; 
for  he  would  in  swearing  to  support  the  Constitution  declare  in 
the  most  solemn  manner  in  his  power,  that  in  his  belief  at  least 
it  imposed  upon  him  no  duty  contrary  to  his  duty  to  God,  since 
to  swear  to  support  a  constution  repu^-nant  to  the  Divine  law  is 
to  take  an  unlawful  oath,  and  to  swear  with  the  deliberate  in- 
tention of  not  keeping  one's  oath  is  to  take  a  false  oath.  After 
having  taken  his  oath  to  support  the  Constitution,  the  Senator 
had,  so  far  as  he  was  concerned,  settled  the  question,  and  it  was 
no  longer  for  him  an  open  question.  In  calling  God  to  witness 
his  determination  to  support  the  Constitution,  he  had  called 
God  to  witness  his  conviction  of  the  compatibility  of  the  Consti- 
tution with  the  law  of  God,  and  therefore  left  himself  no  plea 
for  appealing  from  it  to  a  higher  law.  If  he  discovered  the  in- 
compatibility of  the  imperative  provisions  of  the  Constitution 
only  after  having  taken  his  oath,  he  was  bound  from  that  mo- 
ment to  resign  his  seat.  In  any  view  of  the  case,  therefore,  we 
choose  to  take,  Mr.  Seward  was  not  and  could  not  be  justified 
in  appealing  to  a  law  above  the  Constitution  against  the  Consti- 
tion  while  he  retained  his  seat  under  it  and  remained  bound  by 
his  oath  to  support  it.  It  is  then  perfectly  easy  to  condemn  the 
appeal  of  the  Senator,  without,  as  Abolitionists  and  Free  Soilers 
pretend,  falling  into  the  monstrous  error  of  denying  the  suprem- 
acy of  the  Divine  law,  and  maintaining  that  there  is  no  law 
above  the  Constitution. 

What  we  have  said  is  conclusive  against  the  honorable  Sena- 
tor from  New  York,  but  it  does  not  precisely  apply  to  the  case 
of  those  who  resist  or  refuse  to  obey  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law 
now  that  it  has  been  passed.     These  persons  take  the  ground 


THE    HIGHER    LA  W^. 


35*7 


that  the  law  of  God  is  higher  than  any  human  law,  and  there- 
fore we  can  in  no  case  be  bound  to  obey  a  human  law  that  is  in 
contravention  of  it.  Such  a  law  is  a  violence  rather  than  a  law, 
and  we  are  commanded  by  God  himself  to  resist  it,  at  least  pas- 
sively. All  this  is  undeniable  in  the  case  of  every  human  en- 
actment that  really  does  command  us  to  act  contrary  to  the  law 
of  God.  To  this  we  hold,  as  firmly  as  man  can  hold  to  any 
thing,  and  to  this  every  Christian  is  bound  to  hold  even  unto 
death.  This  is  the  grand  principle  held  by  the  old  martyrs,  and 
therefore  they  chose  martyrdom  rather  than  obedience  to  the 
state  commanding  them  to  act  contrary  to  the  Divine  law. 
But  who  is  to  decide  whether  a  special  civil  enactment  be  or  be 
not  repugnant  to  the  law  of  God  ?  Here  is  a  grave  and  a  per- 
plexing question  for  those  who  have  no  divinely  authorized  in- 
terpreter of  the  Divine  law.  The  Abolitionists  and  Free  Soilers, 
adopting  the  Protestant  principle  of  private  judgment,  claim  the 
right  to  decide  each  for  himself  But  this  places  the  individual 
above  the  state,  private  judgment  above  the  law,  and  is  wholly 
incompatible  with  the  simplest  conception  of  civil  government. 
No  civil  government  can  exist,  none  is  conceivable  even,  where 
every  individual  is  free  to  disobey  its  orders  whenever  they  do 
not  happen  to  square  with  his  private  convictions  of  what  is  the 
law  of  God.  The  principle  of  private  judgment,  adopted  by 
Protestants  in  religious  matters,  it  is  well  known,  has  destroyed 
for  them  the  church  as  an  authoritative  body,  and  put  an  end 
to  every  thing  like  ecclesiastical  authority ;  transferred  to  civil 
mattei-s,  it  would  equally  put  an  end  to  the  state,  and  abolish 
all  civil  authority,  and  establish  the  reign  of  anarchy  or  license. 
Clearly,  if  government  is  to  be  retained,  and  to  govern,  the  right 
to  decide  when  a  civil  enactment  does  or  does  not  conflict  with 
the  law  of  God  cannot  be  lodged  in  the  indi\idual  subject. 
Where  then  shall  it  be  lodged  ?  In  the  state  ?  Then  are  you 
bound  to  absolute  obedience  to  any  and  every  law  the  state  may 
enact ;  you  make  the  state  supreme,  absolute,  and  deny  your 
own  principle  of  a  higher  law  than  the  civil  law.  You  have 
then  no  appeal  from  the  state,  and  no  relief  for  conscience,  which 


358  THE    HIGHER    LAW. 

is  absolute  civil  despotism.  Here  is  a  sad  dilemma  for  our  un- 
catholic  countrymen,  which  admirably  demonstrates  the  unsuit- 
ableness  of  Protestant  principles  for  practical  life.  If  they  assert 
the  principle  of  private  judgment  in  order  to  save  individual  hb- 
erty,  they  lose  government  and  fall  into  anarchy.  If  they  assert 
the  authority  of  the  state  in  order  to  save  government,  they  lose 
liberty  and  fall  under  absolute  civil  despotism,  and  it  is  an  his- 
torical fact  that  the  Protestant  world  perpetually  alternates  be- 
tween civil  despotism  and  unbridled  license,  and  after  three 
hundred  years  of  experimenting  finds  itself  as  far  as  ever  from 
solving  the  problem,  how  to  reconcile  liberty  and  authority. 
Strange  that  men  do  not  see  that  the  solution  must  be  sought 
in  God,  not  in  man  !  Alas !  reformers  make  a  sad  blunder 
when  they  reject  the  Church  instituted  by  God  himself  for  the 
express  purpose  of  interpreting  his  law, — the  only  protector  of 
the  people,  on  the  one  hand,  against  despotism,  and  of  govern- 
ment, on  the  other,  against  license  ! 

But  the  people  cannot  avail  themselves  of  their  own  blunder 
to  withdraw  themselves  from  their  obligation  to  obey  the  laws. 
Government  itself  is  a  divine  ordinance,  is  ordained  of  God. 
"  Let  every  soul  be  subject  to  the  higher  powers ;  for  there  is 
no  power  but  from  God  ;  and  the  powers  that  be  are  ordained 
of  God.  Therefore  he  that  resisteth  the  power  resisteth  the  or- 
dinance of  God.  And  they  that  resist  purchase  to  themselves 
damnation."  We  do  not  say  that  all  the  acts  of  government 
are  ordained  of  God ;  for  if  we  did,  we  could  not  assert  the 
reahty  of  a  law  higher  than  that  of  the  state,  and  should  be 
forced  to  regard  every  civil  enactment  as  a  precept  of  the  Di- 
vine law.  In  ordinary  government,  God  does  not  ordain  obedi- 
ence to  all  and  every  of  its  acts,  but  to  those  only  of  its  acts 
which  come  within  the  limits  of  his  own  law.  He  does  not 
make  civil  government  the  supreme  and  infalhble  organ  of  his 
will  on  earth,  and  therefore  it  may  err,  and  contravene  his  will ; 
and  when  and  where  it  does,  its  acts  are  null  and  void.  But 
government  itself,  as  ci\il  authority,  is  a  divine  ordinance,  and, 
within  the  law  of  God,  clothed  with  the  i-ight  to  command  and 


THE    HIGHEU    LAW.  359 

to  enforce  obedience.  No  appeal,  therefore,  from  an}'  act  of 
government,  which  in  princi})le  denies  the  divine  right  of  gov- 
ernment, or  which  is  incompatible  with  the  assertion  and  main- 
tenance of  civil  authority,  can  be  entertained.  Since  govern- 
ment as  civil  authority  is  an  ordinance  of  God,  and  as  such  the 
Divine  law,  any  course  of  action,  or  the  assertion  of  any  princi- 
ple of  action,  incompatible  with  its  existence  as  government,  is 
necessarily  forbidden  by  the  law  of  God.  The  law  of  God  i^ 
always  the  equal  of  the  law  of  God,  and  can  never*  be  in  con- 
flict with  itself.  Consequently  no  appeal  against  government  as 
civil  authority  to  the  law  of  God  is  admissible,  because  the  law 
of  God  is  as  supreme  in  any  one  of  its  enactments  as  in 
another. 

Now  it  is  clear  that  Mr.  Seward  and  his  friends,  the  Aboli- 
tionists and  Fi-ee  Soilers,  have  nothing  to  which  they  can  appeal 
from  the  action  of  government  but  their  private  interpretation 
of  the  law  of  God,  that  is  to  say,  their  own  private  judgment 
or  opinion  as  individuals ;  for  it  is  notorious  that  they  are  good 
Protestants,  holding  the  pretended  right  of  private  judgment, 
and  rejecting  all  authoritative  interpretation  of  the  Divine  law. 
To  appeal  from  the  government  to  private  judgment  is  to  place 
private  judgment  above  public  authority,  the  individual  above 
the  state,  which,  as  we  have  seen,  is  incompatible  with  the  very 
existence  of  government,  and  therefore,  since  government  is  a 
divine  ordinance,  absolutely  forbidden  by  the  law  of  God, — that 
very  higher  law  invoked  to  justify  resistance  to  civil  enactments. 
Here  is  an  important  consideration,  which  condemns,  on  the 
authority  of  God  himself,  the  pretended  right  of  private  judg- 
ment, the  grossest  absurdity  that  ever  entered  the  heads  of  men 
outride  of  Bedlam,  and  proves  that,  in  attempting  to  set  aside 
on  its  authority  a  civil  enactment,  we  come  into  conflict  not 
with  the  human  law  only,  but  also  with  the  law  of  God  itself. 
No  man  can  ever  be  justifiable  in  resisting  the  civil  law  under 
the  pretence  that  it  is  repugnant  to  the  Divine  law,  when  he 
has  only  his  private  judgment,  or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  his 
private  interpretation  of  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  to  tell  him  what 


360  THE    HIGHER    LAW. 

the  Divine  law  is  on  the  point  in  question,  because  the  principle 
on  which  he  would  act  in  doing  so  would  be  repugnant  to  the 
very  existence  of  government,  and  therefore  in  contravention  of 
the  ordinance,  therefore  of  the  law,  of  God. 

Man's  prime  necessity  is  society,  and  the  prime  necessity  of 
society  is  government.  The  question,  whether  government  shall 
or  shall  not  be  sustained,  is  at  bottom  only  the  question,  wheth- 
er the  human  race  shall  continue  to  subsist  or  not.  Man  is 
essentially  a  social  being,  and  cannot  hve  without  society,  and 
society  is  inconceivable  without  government.  Extinguish  gov- 
ernment, and  you  extinguish  society;  extinguish  society,  and 
you  extinguish  man.  Inasmuch  as  God  has  created  and  or- 
dained the  existence  of  the  human  race,  he  has  founded  and 
ordained  government,  and  made  it  absolutely  obligatory  on  us 
to  sustain  it,  to  refrain  in  principle  and  action  from  whatever 
would  tend  to  destroy  it,  or  to  render  its  existence  insecure. 
They  who  set  aside  or  resist  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law  on  the 
ground  of  its  supposed  repugnance  to  the  law  of  God  are,  then, 
no  more  justifiable  than  we  have  seen  was  the  honorable  Senator 
from  New  York.  In  no  case  can  any  man  ever  be  justified  in 
seltino-  aside  or  resisting  a  civil  enactment,  save  on  an  authority 
higher  than  his  own  and  that  of  the  government.  This  higher 
authority  is  not  recognized  by  the  Abolitionists  and  Free 
Soilers ;  they  neither  have  nor  claim  to  have  any  such  author- 
ity to  allege ;  consequently,  they  are  bound  to  absolute  submis- 
sion to  the  civil  authority,  not  only  in  the  case  of  the  Fugitive 
Slave  Law,  but  in  every  case,  however  repugnant  such  submis- 
sion may  be  to  their  private  convictions  and  feelings,  or  what 
they  call  their  conscience,  for  conscience  itself  is  respectable  only 
when  it  is  authorized  by  the  law  of  God,  or  is  in  conformity 
with  it. 

That  tliis  is  civil  despotism,  that  is,  the  assertion  of  the  abso- 
lute supremacy  of  the  state,  we  do  not  deny ;  but  that  is  not 
our  fault  If  men,  by  rejecting  the  divinely  authorized  inter- 
preter of  the  law  of  God,  voluntarily  place  themselves  in  such  a 
condition  that  they  have  no  alternative  but  either  civil  despotism 


THE    HIGHER    LAW.  361 

or  resistance  to  the  ordinance  of  God,  the  fault  is  their  own. 
They  must  expect  to  reap  what  they  sow.  They  were  warned 
betimes,  but  they  would  heed  no  warning;  they  would  have 
their  own  way ;  and  if  they  now  find  that  their  own  way  leads 
to  death,  they  have  only  themselves  to  blame.  It  is  not  we  who 
advocate  despotism,  but  they  who  render  it  inevitable  for  them- 
selves, if  they  wish  to  escape  the  still  greater  evil  of  absolute 
license.  As  Catholics  we  wash  our  hands  of  the  consequences 
which  they  cannot  escape,  and  w^hich  any  man  with  half  an  eye 
might  have  seen  would  necessarily  follow  the  assertion  of  the 
absurd  and  ridiculous,  not  to  say  blasphemous,  principle  of  pri- 
vate judgment.  We  have  never  been  guilty  of  the  extreme 
folly  of  proclaiming  that  principle,  and  of  superinducing  the 
necessity  of  asserting  civil  despotism  as  the  only  possible  relief 
from  anarchy.  We  are  able  to  assert  liberty  without  under- 
mining authority,  and  authority  without  injury  to  liberty ;  for 
we  have  been  contented  to  let  God  himself  be  our  teacher  and 
our  legislator,  instead  of  weak,  erring,  vain,  and  capricious  men, 
facetiously  ycleped  reformers.  As  Catholics,  we  were  not  among 
those  who  undertook  to  improve  on  Infinite  Wisdom,  and  to 
reform  the  institutions  of  the  Almighty.  We  are  taught  by  a 
divinely  authorized  Teacher,  that  government  is  the  ordinance 
of  God,  and  that  we  are  to  respect  and  obey  it  as  such  in  all 
things  not  repugnant  to  the  law  of  God;  and  we  have  an  au- 
thority higher  than  its,  higher  than  our  owii,  to  tell  us,  without 
error,  or  the  possibility  of  error, — because  by  Divine  assistance 
and  protection  rendered  infallible, — when  the  acts  of  govern- 
ment conflict  with  the  law  of  God,  and  it  becomes  our  duty  to 
resist  the  former  in  obedience  to  the  latter.  Civil  authority  is 
respected  and  obeyed  when  respected  and  obeyed  in  all  things 
it  has  from  God  the  right  to  do  or  command ;  and  liberty  is 
preserved  inviolate  when  nothing  can  be  exacted  from  us  in 
contravention  of  the  Divine  law,  and  we  are  free  to  disobey  the 
prince  when  he  commands  us  to  violate  the  law  of  God.  We 
then  do  and  can  experience  none  of  the  perplexity  which  is  ex- 
perienced by  ouv  uncatholic  countrymen.     We  have  an  infallible 


362  THE    HIGHER    LAW. 

Church  to  tell  us  when  there  is  a  conflict  between  the  human 
law  and  the  Divine,  to  save  us  from  the  necessity,  in  order  to  get 
rid  of  desj^otism,  of  asserting  individualism,  which  is  the  denial 
of  all  government,  and,  in  order  to  get  rid  of  individualism,  of 
asserting  civil  despotism,  that  is,  the  supremacy  of  the  state,  the 
grave  of  all  freedom.  We  have  never  to  appeal  to  the  principle 
of  despotism  nor  to  the  principle  of  anarchy.  We  have  always 
a  public  authority,  which,  as  it  is  inerrable,  can  never  be  oppres- 
sive, to  guide  and  direct  us,  and  if  we  resist  the  civil  law,  it  is 
only  in  obedience  to  a  higher  law,  clearly  and  distinctly  declared 
by  a  public  authority  higher  than  the  individual,  and  higher 
than  the  state.  Our  readers,  therefore,  will  not  accuse  us  of 
advocating  civil  despotism,  which  we  abhor,  because  we  show 
that  they  who  reject  God's  Church,  and  assert  private  judgment, 
have  no  alternative  but  despotism  or  license.  They  are,  as 
Protestants,  under  the  necessity  of  being  slaves  and  despots,  not 
we  who  are  Catholics.  We  enjoy,  and  we  alone  enjoy,  the 
glorious  prerogative  of  being  at  once  freemen  and  loyal  subjects. 
There  is  no  principle  on  which  the  Abolitionists  and  Free 
Soilers  can  justify  their  resistance  to  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law. 
They  cannot  appeal  to  the  law  of  God,  for,  having  no  authority 
competent  to  declare  it,  the  law  of  God  is  for  them  as  if  it 
were  not.  It  is  for  them  a  mere  unmeaning  word,  or  meaning 
only  their  private  or  individual  judgment,  which  is  no  law  at 
all,  and  if  it  were  would  at  best  be  only  a  human,  and  the  low- 
est conceivable  human  law.  The  highest  human  law  is  un- 
questionably the  law  of  the  state,  as  the  state  is  the  highest  hu- 
man authority  conceivable.  No  appeal  can  then  lie  from  the 
state  to  another  human  authority,  least  of  all  to  the  individual ; 
for  appeals  do  not  go  downwards,  do  not  lie  from  the  higher  to 
the  lower,  as  ultra  democracy  would  seem  to  imply.  The  high- 
est conceivable  human  authority  has  passed  the  law  in  question, 
and  in  so  doing  has  declared  it  compatible  with  the  law  of  God ; 
and  as  its  opponents  have  only  a  human  authority  at  best  to  re- 
verse the  judgment  of  the  state,  nothing  remains  for  them  but 
to  yield  it  full  and  loyal  obedience. 


THE    HIGHER    LAW.  363 

We  have  dwelt  at  length  on  this  point,  because  it  is  one  of 
great  importance  in  itself,  and  because  we  are  anxious  to  clear 
away  the  mist  with  which  it  has  been  surrounded,  and  to  pre- 
vent any  denial  on  the  one  hand,  or  misapjilication  on  the 
other,  of  the  great  principle  of  the  supremacy  of  the  Divine 
law.  The  misapplication  of  a  great  principle  is  always  itself  a 
great  and  dangerous  error,  and  often,  perhaps  always,  leads  to 
the  denial  of  the  principle.  Mr.  Seward  and  his  friends  asserted 
a  great  and  glorious  principle,  but  misapplied  it.  Their  oppo- 
nents, the  friends  of  the  Constitution  and  the  Union,  seeino- 
clearly  the  error  of  the  application,  have,  in  some  instances  at 
least,  denied  the  principle  itself,  and  their  papers  Noith  and 
South  are  filled  with  sneers  at  the  higher  law  doctrine.  The  one 
error  induces  the  other,  and  w^e  hardly  know  which,  under  ex- 
isting circumstances,  is  the  most  to  be  deprecated.  Each  error 
favors  a  dangerous  popular  tendency  of  the  times.  We  have 
spoken  of  the  tendency,  under  the  name  of  liberty,  to  anarchy 
and  license  ;  but  there  is  another  tendency,  under  the  pretext  of 
authority,  to  civil  despotism,  or  wdiat  has  been  very  properly  de- 
nominated Statolatry,  or  the  worship  of  the  state,  that  is,  ele\  at- 
ing  the  state  above  the  Church,  and  putting  it  in  the  place  of 
God.  Both  tendencies  have  the  same  origin,  that  is,  in  the 
Protestant  rejection  of  the  spiritual  authority  of  the  Church  on 
the  one  hand,  and  the  assertion  of  private  judgment  on  the 
other  ;  and  in  fact,  both  are  but  the  opposite  phases  or  poles  of 
one  and  the  same  principle.  The  two  tendencies  proceed  pan 
passu,  and  while  the  one  undermines  all  authoritj^,  the 
other  grasps  at  all  powers  and  usurps  all  rights,  and  modern  so- 
ciety in  consequence  is  cursed  at  once  with  the  opposite  e\nls  of 
anarchy  and  of  civil  despotism.  The  cry  for  liberty  abolishes 
all  loyalty,  and  destroys  the  principle  and  the  spirit  of  obedience, 
while  the  usurpations  of  the  state  leave  to  conscience  no  freedom, 
to  religion  no  independence.  The  state  tramples  on  the  spirit- 
ual prerogatives  of  the  Church,  assumes  to  itself  the  functions 
of  schoolmaster  and  director  of  consciences,  and  the  multitude 
Clap  their  hands,  and  call  it  liberty  and  progress  !     We  see  this 


364  THE    HIGHER    LAW. 

in  the  popular  demand  for  state  educatioi),  and  in  the  joy  that 
the  men  of  the  world  manifest  at  the  nefarious  conduct  of  the 
Sardinian  government  in  breaking"  the  faith  of  treaties  and  vio- 
lating the  rights  of  the  Church.  When  it  concerns  the  Church, 
the  supremacy  of  the  state  is  proclaimed,  and  when  it  concerns 
government  or  law,  then  it  is  individualism  that  is  shouted. 
Such  is  our  age,  our  boasted  nineteenth  century. 

Now  there  is  a  right  and  a  wrong  way  of  defending  the 
truth,  and  it  is  always  easier  to  defend  the  truth  on  sound  than 
on  unsound  principles.  If  men  were  less  blind  and  headstrong, 
they  would  see  that  the  higlier  law  can  be  asserted  without 
any  attack  upon  legitimate  civil  authority,  and  legitimate  civil 
authority  and  the  majesty  of  the  law  can  be  vindicated  with- 
out asserting  the  absolute  supremacy  of  the  civil  power,  and 
falling  into  statolatory, — as  absurd  a  species  of  idolatry  as 
the  worship  of  stocks  and  stones.  The  assertion  of  the  higher 
law,  as  Abolitionists  and  Free  Soilers  make  it,  without  any 
competent  authority  to  define  and  declare  that  law,  leads 
to  anarchy  and  unbridled  license,  and  therefore  we  are  oblig- 
ed, as  we  value  society,  law,  order,  morality,  to  oppose  them. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  denial  of  the  higher  law  as  the  condi- 
tion of  opposing  them  asserts  the  supremacy  in  all  things  of  the 
state,  and  subjects  us  in  all  things  unreservedly  to  the  civil 
power,  which  is  statolatory,  and  absolu^  civil  despotism.  No 
wise  and  honest  statesman  can  do  either.  But — here  is  the 
difficulty — the  Protestant  statesman  is  obliged  to  do  one  or  the 
other,  or  both,  at  one  moment  one,  at  the  next  moment^  the 
other.  This  is  what  we  have  wished  to  make  plain  to  the  dull- 
est capacity.  Protestantism  is  clearly  not  adapted  to  practical 
life,  and  its  principles  are  as  inapplicable  in  politics  as  in  religion. 
There  is  no  practical  assertion  of  true  liberty  or  legitimate  au- 
thority on  Protestant  principles,  and  neither  is  or  can  be  assert- 
ed but  as  men  resort,  avowedly  or  otherwise,  to  Catholic  princi- 
ples. Hence  the  reason  why  we  have  been  uitable  to  discuss 
the  question  presented,  and  give  a  rational  solution  of  the  diffi- 
culty, without  recurring  to  our  Church.     In  recurring  to  her,  we 


THE    HIGHER    LAW.  365 

bave,  no  doubt,  offended  the  friends  of  tlie  Constitution  and  tlie 
Union,  tlie  party  with  whom  are  our  sympathies,  as  much  as  we 
have  their  enemies ;  but  this  is  no  fault  of  ours,  for  we  cannot 
go  contrary  to  what  God  has  ordained.  He  has  not  seen  proper 
so  to  constitute  society  and  endow  government  that  they  can 
get  on  without  his  Church.  She  is  an  integral,  an  essential  ele- 
ment in  the  constitution  of  society,  and  it  is  madness  and  folly 
to  think  of  managing  it  and  securing  its  well-being  without  her. 
She  is  the  solution  of  all  difficulties,  and  without  her  none  are 
solvable. 

For  us  Catholics,  the  Fugitive  Slave  Law  presents  no  sort  of 
difficulty.  We  are  taught,  as  we  have  said,  to  respect  and  obey 
the  government  as  the  ordinance  of  God,  in  all  things  not  de- 
clared by  our  Church  to  be  repugnant  to  the  Divine  law^  The 
law  is  e\4dently  constitutional,  and  is  necessary  to  carry  out  an 
express  and  imperative  provision  of  the  Constitution,  which  or- 
dains (Art.  IV.  Sect.  2),  that  "  No  person  held  to  service  or 
labor  in  one  State,  under  the  laws  thereof,  escaping  into  another, 
shall,  in  consequence  of  any  law  or  regulation  therein,  be  dis- 
charged from  such  service  or  labor,  but  shall  be  delivered  up  on 
claim  of  the  party  to  whom  such  service  or  labor  may  be  due." 
This  is  imperative,  and  with  regard  to  its  meaning  there  is  no 
disagreement.  By  this  the  slaveholders  have  the  right  to  claim 
their  fugitive  slaves  in  the  non-slaveholding  States,  and  the  non- 
slaveholding  States  are  bound  to  deliver  them  up,  when  claimed. 
For  the  purpose  of  carrying  out  this  constitutional  provision, 
Congress  passed  a  law,  in  1793,  which  has  proved  ineffectual, 
and  it  has  passed  the  recent  law,  more  strigent  in  its  provisions, 
and  likely  to  prove  efficient,  for  the  same  purpose.  We  can 
see  nothing  in  the  law  contrary  to  the  Constitution,  and,  as  high 
legal  authority  has  pronouced  it  constitutional,  we  must  presum.e 
it  to  be  so.  Nobody  really  regards  it  as  unconstitutional,  and 
the  only  special  objection  to  it  is, — what  is  no  objection  at  all, — 
that  it  is  likely  to  answer  its  purpose.  Now  as  the  law  is  nec- 
essary to  secure  the  fulfilment  of  the  obligations  imposed  by  the 
Constitution,  and  as  our  Church  has  never  decided  that  to  res- 


366  THE    HIGHER    LAW. 

tore  a  fugitive  slave  to  its  owner  is  i^e?-  se  contrary  to  tlie  law  of 
God,  we  are  bound  to  obey  the  law,  and  could  not,  without  re- 
sisting the  ordinance  of  God  and  purchasing  to  oui-selves  dam- 
nation, refuse  to  obey  it.     This  settles  the  question  for  us. 

As  to  Protestants  who  allege  that  the  law  is  contrary  to  the 
law  of  God,  and  therefore  that  they  cannot  with  a  good  con- 
science obey  it,  we  have  very  little  in  addition  to  say.  There 
are  no  principles  in  coinmon  between  them  and  us,  on  which  the 
question  can  be  decided.  We  have  shown  them  that  they  are 
bound  to  obey  the  civil  law  till  they  can  bring  a  higher  author- 
ity than  the  state,  and  a  higher  than  their  own  private  judg- 
ment, to  set  it  aside  as  repugnant  to  the  law  of  God.  This 
higher  authority  they  have  not,  and  therefore  for  them  there  is 
no  higher  law.  Will  they  allege  the  Sacred  Scriptures  ?  That 
will  avail  them  nothing  till  they  show  that  they  have  legal  pos- 
session of  the  Scriptures,  and  that  they  are  constituted  by  Al- 
mighty God  a  court  with  authority  to  interpret  them  and  declare 
their  sense.  As  this  is  what  they  can  never  do,  we  cannot  ar- 
gue the  Scriptural  question  with  them.  We  will  only  add,  that 
there  is  no  passage  in  either  the  Old  Testament  or  the  New  that 
declares  it  repugnant  to  the  law  of  God,  or  law  of  eternal  jus- 
tice, to  deliver  u])  the  fugitive  slave  to  his  master  ;  and  St.  Paul 
sent  back,  after  converting  him,  the  fugitive  slave  Onesimus  to 
his  master  Philemon.  This  is  enough  ;  for  St.  Paul  appears  to 
have  done  more  than  the  recent  law  of  Congress  demands  ;  he 
seems  to  have  sent  back  the  fugitive  without  being  requested  to 
do  so  by  his  owner ;  but  the  law  of  Congress  only  requires  the 
fugitive  to  be  delivered  up  when  claimed  by  his  master.  It  will 
not  do  for  those  who  appeal  to  the  Sacred  Scriptures  to  maintam 
either  that  St.  Paul  was  ignorant  of  the  law  of  God,  or  that  he 
acted  contrary  to  it.  This  fact  alone  concludes  the  Scriptural 
question  against  them. 

But  we  have  detained  our  readers  long  enough.  We  have 
said  more  than  was  necessary  to  satisfy  the  intelligent  and  tae 
candid,  and  reasoning  is  thrown  away  upon  factionists  and  fan- 
atics, Abolitionists  and  philanthropists.     There  is  no  question 


THE    HIGHER    LAW.  367 

that  the  country  is  seriously  in  danger.  What,  with  the  sec- 
tionists  at  the  North  and  the  sectionists  at  the  South,  with  the 
great  dearth  of  true  patriots,  and  still  greater  dearth  of  states- 
men, in  all  sections  of  the  Union,  it  will  go  hard  but  the  Union 
itself  receive  some  severe  shocks.  Yet  we  trust  in  God  it  will 
be  preserved,  although  the  American  people  are  far  from  merit- 
ing so  great  a  boon.  After  the  humiliation  of  ourselves,  and 
prayer  to  God,  vve  see  nothing  to  be  done  to  save  the  country, 
but  for  all  the  friends  of  the  Union,  whether  heretofore  called 
Wliigs  or  Democrats,  to  rally  around  the  Union,  and  form  a 
grand  national  party,  in  opposition  to  the  sectionists,  factionists, 
and  fanatics,  of  all  complexions,  sorts,  and  sizes.  It  is  no  time 
now  to  indulge  old  party  animosities,  or  to  contend  for  old  party 
organizations.  The  country  is  above  party,  and  all  who  love 
their  country,  and  wish  to  save  the  noble  institutions  left  us  by 
our  fathers,  should  foil  into  the  ranks  of  one  and  the  same  party, 
and  w'ork  side  by  side,  and  shoulder  to  shoulder,  for  the  main- 
tenance of  the  Union  and  the  supremacy  of  law.  We  see 
strong  indications  that  such  a  party  is  rapidly  forming  through- 
out the  country,  and  we  say,  let  it  be  formed, — the  sooner  the 
better.  Let  the  party  take  high  conservative  ground,  against  all 
sorts  of  radicalism  and  ultraism,  and  inscribe  on  its  banner.  The 
Preservation  of  the  Union,  and  the  Supremacy  of  Law, 
and  it  will  command  the  support,  we  doubt  not,  of  a  large  ma- 
jority of  the  American  people,  and  deserve  and  receive,  we  de- 
voutly hope,  the  protection  of  Almighty  God,  who,  we  must 
believe,  has  after  all  great  designs  in  this  country.  Above  all, 
let  our  Catholic  fellow-citizens  in  this  crisis  be  faithful  to  their 
duty,  even  though  they  find  Mr.  Fillmore's  administration  and 
our  Protestant  countrymen  madly  and  foolishly  hostile  to  them  ; 
for  on  the  Catholic  population,  under  God,  depend  the  future 
destinies  of  these  United  States.  The  principles  of  our  holy  re- 
ligion, the  prayers  of  our  Church,  and  the  fidelity  to  their  trusts 
of  the  Catholic  portion  of  the  people,  are  the  only  sure  reliance 
left  us. 


CATHOLICITY    NECESSARY 


CATHOLICITY   NECESSARY   TO   SUSTAIN 
POPULAR   LIBERTY. 

OCTOBER,    1845. 

By  popular  liberty,  we  mean  democracy  ;  by  democracy,  we 
mean  the  democratic  form  of  government ;  by  the  democratic 
form  of  government,  we  mean  that  form  of  government  which 
vests  the  sovereignty  in  the  people  as  population,  and  which  is 
administered  by  the  people,  either  in  person  or  by  their  dele- 
gate's. By  sustaining  popular  liberty,  we  mean,  not  the  intro- 
duction or  institution  of  democracy,  but  preserving  it  when  and 
where  it  is  already  introduced,  and  securing  its  free,  orderly,  and 
wholesome  action.  By  Catholicity,  we  mean  the  Roman  Catho- 
lic Church,  faith,  morals,  and  worship.  The  thesis  we  propose 
to  maintain  is,  therefore,  that  without  the  Roman  Catholic  re- 
ligion it  is  impossible  to  preserve  a  democratic  government,  and 
secure  its  free,  orderly,  and  wholesome  action.  Infidelity,  Prot- 
estantism, heathenism  may  institute  a  democracy,  but  only 
Catholicity  can  sustain  it. 

Our  own  govei-nment,  in  its  origin  and  constitutional  form,  is 
not  a  democracy,  but,  if  we  may  use  the  expression,  a  limited 
elective  aristocracy.  In  its  theory,  the  representative,  within  the 
limits  prescribed  by  the  Constitution,  when  once  elected,  and 
during  the  time  for  which  he  is  elected,  is,  in  his  official  action, 
independent  of  his  constituents,  and  not  responsible  to  them  for 
his  acts.  For  this  reason,  we  call  the  government  an  elective 
aristocracy.  But,  practically,  the  government  framed  by  our 
fathers  no  longer  exists,  save  in  name.  Its  original  character 
has  disappeared,  or  is  rapidly  disappearing.  The  Constitution  is 
a  dead  letter,  except  so  far  as  it  serves  to  prescribe  the  modes 
of  election,  the  rule  of  the  majority,  the  distribution  and  tenure 
of  offices,  and  the  union  and  separation  of  the  functions  of  gov- 
ernment. Since  1828,  it  has  been  becoming  in  practice,  and  is 
now,  substantially,  a  pure  democracy,  with  no  effective  constitu- 


TO    DEMOCRACY.  3G9 

tioTi  but  the  ^vill  of  the  inajority  for  the  time  being.  Whether 
the  change  has  been  for  tlie  better  or  the  worse,  we  need  not 
stop  to  inquire.  The  change  was  inevitable,  because  men  are 
more  wilhng  to  advance  themselves  by  flattering  the  people  and 
perverting  the  Constitution,  than  they  are  by  self-denial  to  serve 
their  country.  The  change  has  been  effected,  and  there  is  no 
return  to  the  original  theory  of  the  government.  Any  man  who 
should  plant  himself  on  the  Constitution,  and  attempt  to  arrest 
the  democratic  tendency, — no  matter  what  his  character,  ability, 
virtues,  services, — would  be  crushed  and  ground  to  powder. 
Your  Calhouns  must  give  way  for  your  Polks  and  Van  Burens, 
your  Websters  for  your  Harrisons  and  Tylers.  No  man,  who  is 
not  prepared  to  play  the  demagogue,  to  stoop  to  flatter  the  peo- 
ple, and,  in  one  direction  or  another,  to  exaggerate  the  demo- 
cratic* tendency,  can  receive  the  nomination  for  an  important 
office,  or  have  influence  in  public  affiiirs.  The  reign  of  great 
men,  of  distinguished  statesmen  and  firm  patriots,  is  over,  and 
that  of  the  demagogues  has  begun.  Your  most  important  offi- 
ces are  hereafter  to  be  filled  by  third  and  fourth-rate  men, — men 
too  insignificant  to  excite  strong  opposition,  and  too  flexible  in 
their  principles  not  to  be  willing  to  take  any  direction  the  ca- 
prices of  the  mob — or  the  interests  of  the  wire-pullers  of  the  mob 
— may  demand.  Evil  or  no  evil,  such  is  the  fact,  and  we  must 
conform  to  it. 

Such  being  the  fact,  the  question  comes  up.  How  are  we  to 
sustain  popular  liberty,  to  secure  the  free,  orderly,  and  wholesome 
action  of  our  practical  democracy  ?  The  question  is  an  import- 
ant one,  and  cannot  be  blinked  with  impunity. 

The  theory  of  democracy  is.  Construct  your  government  and 
commit  it  to  tlie  people  to  be  taken  care  of.  Democracy  is  not 
properly  a  government ;  but  what  is  called  the  government  is  a 
huge  machine  contrived  to  be  wielded  by  the  people  as  they 
shall  think  proper.  In  relation  to  it  the  people  are  assumed  to 
be  what  x\lmighty  God  is  to  the  universe,  the  fii'st  cause,  the 
medial  cause,  the  final  cause.     It  emanates  from  them  ;  it  is 


3^0  CATHOLICITY    NECESSARY 

administered  by  tliem,  and  for  them ;  and,  moreover,  they  are 
to  keep  watch  and  provide  for  its  right  administration. 

It  is  a  beautiful  theory,  and  would  work  admirably,  if  it  were 
not  for  one  little  difficulty,  namely, — the  people  are  fallible,  both 
individually  and  collecAively,  and  governed  by  their  2^ctssions 
and  hiterests,  which  not  unfrequently  lead  them  far  astray,  and 
produce  much  mischief  The  government  must  necessarily  fol- 
low their  will ;  and  whenever  that  will  happens  to  be  blinded 
by  passion,  or  misled  by  ignorance  or  interest,  the  government 
must  inevitably  go  wrong  ;  and  government  can  never  go  wrong 
without  doing  injustice.  The  government  may  be  provided  for ; 
the  people  may  take  care  of  that ;  but  who  or  what  is  to  take 
care  of  the  people,  and  assure  us  that  they  will  always  wield  the 
government  so  as  to  promote  justice  and  equality,  or  maintain 
order,  and  the  equal  rights  of  all,  of  all  classes  and  interests  ? 

Do  not  answer  by  referring  us  to  the  virtue  and  intelligence 
of  the  people.  We  are  writing  seriously,  and  have  no  leisure 
to  enjoy  a  joke,  even  if  it  be  a  good  one.  We  have  too  much 
principle,  we  hope,  to  seek  to  humbug,  and  have  had  too  much 
experience  to  be  humbugged.  We  are  Americans,  American 
born,  American  bred,  and  we  love  our  country,  and  will,  when 
called  upon,  defend  it,  against  any  and  every  enemy,  to  the  best 
of  our  feeble  ability ;  but,  though  we  by  no  means  rate  Ameri- 
can virtue  and  intelligence  so  low  as  do  those  who  will  abuse  us 
for  not  rating  it  higher,  we  cannot  consent  to  hoodwink  our- 
selves, or  to  claim  for  our  countrymen  a  degree  of  virtue  and 
intelligence  they  do  not  possess.  We  are  acquainted  with  no 
salutary  errors,  and  are  forbidden  to  seek  even  a  good  end  by 
any  but  honest  means.  The  virtue  and  intelligence  of  the  Amer- 
ican people  are  not  suflSoient  to  secure  the  free,  orderly,  and 
wholesome  action  of  the  government ;  for  they  do  not  secure  it. 
The  government  commits,  every  now  and  then,  a  sad  blunder, 
and  the  general  policy  it  adopts  must  prove,  in  the  long  run, 
suicidal.  It  has  adopted  a  most  iniquitous  policy,  and  its  most 
unjust  measures  are  its  most  populai-  measures,  such  as  it  would 
be  fatal  to  any  man's  political  success  directly  and  openly  to  op- 


TO  DEMOCRACr.  37l 

pose  ;  and  we  think  we  hazard  nothing  in  saying,  our  free  insti- 
tutions cannot  be  sustained  without  an  augmentation  of  popular 
virtue  and  intelligence.  We  do  not  say  the  people  are  not  ca- 
pable of  a  sufficient  degree  of  \-irtue  and  intelligence  to  sustain 
a  democracy  ;  all  we  say  is,  they  cannot  do  it  without  virtue  and 
intelligence,  nor  without  a  higher  degree  of  \artue  and  intelli- 
gence than  they  have  as  yet  attained  to.  We  do  not  apprehend 
that  many  of  our  countrymen,  and  we  are  sure  no  one  whose 
own  virtue  and  intelligence  entitle  his  opinion  to  any  weio-ht, 
will  dispute  this.  Then  the  question  of  the  means  of  sustainino- 
our  democracy  resolves  itself  into  the  question  of  augmentino- 
the  virtue  and  intelligence  of  the  people. 

The  press  makes  readers,  but  does  little  to  make  virtuous  and 
intelligent  readers.  The  newspaper  press  is,  for  the  most  part, 
under  the  control  of  men  of  very  ordinary  abilities,  lax  princi- 
ples, and  limited  acquirements.  It  echoes  and  exaggerates  pop- 
ular errors,  and  does  little  or  nothing  to  create  a  sound  public 
opinion.  Your  popular  literature  caters  to  popular  taste,  pas- 
sions, prejudices,  ignorance,  and  errors ;  it  is  by  no  means  above 
the  average  degree  of  virtue  and  intelligence  which  already  ob- 
tains, and  can  do  nothing  to  create  a  higher  standard  of  virtue 
or  tone  of  thought.     On  what,  then,  are  we  to  rely  ? 

"  On  Education,"  auswer  Frances  Wright,  Abner  Kneeland, 
the  Hon.  Secretary  of  the  Massachusetts  Board  of  Education,  and 
the  Educationists  generally.  But  we  must  remember  that  we 
must  have  virtue  and  intelligence.  Virtue  without  intelligence  will 
only  fit  the  mass  to  be  duped  by  the  artful  and  designing ;  and 
intelligence  without  virtue  only  makes  one  the  abler  and  more 
successful  villain.  Education  must  be  of  the  right  sort,  if  it  is 
to  answer  our  purpose  ;  for  a  bad  education  is  worse  than  none. 
The  Mahometans  are  great  sticklers  for  education,  and,  if  we 
recollect  aright,  it  is  laid  down  in  the  Koran,  that  every  believer 
must  at  least  be  taught  to  read ;  but  we  do  not  find  their  educa- 
tion does  much  to  advance  them  in  virtue  and  intelligence.  Edu- 
cation, moreover,  demands  educatoi*s,  and  educators  of  the  right 
sort.     Where  are  these  to  be  obtained  ?     Who  is  to  select  them, 


372  CATHOLICITY    NECESSARY 

judge  of  their  qualifications,  sustain  or  dismiss  tiem  ?  The  peo- 
2)le  ?  Then  you  place  edueation  in  the  same  category  with  de- 
mocracy. You  make  the  people  through  their  representatives 
the  educators.  The  people  will  select  and  sustain  only  such 
educators  as  represent  their  own  virtues,  vices,  intelligence,  prej- 
udices, and  errors.  Whether  they  educate  mediately  or  im- 
mediately, they  can  impart  only  what  they  have  and  are.  Con- 
sequently, with  them  for  educators,  we  can,  by  means  even  of 
universal  education,  get  no  increase  of  virtue  and  intelligence  to 
bear  on  the  government.  The  people  may  educate,  but  where 
is  that  which  takes  care  that  they  educate  in  a  proper  manner  ? 
Here  is  the  very  difficulty  we  began  by  pointing  out.  The  peo- 
ple take  care  of  the  government  and  education  ;  but  who  or  what 
is  to  take  care  of  the  people,  who  need  taking  care  of  quite  as 
much  as  either  education  or  government  ? — for,  rightly  consid- 
ered, neither  government  nor  education  has  any  other  legitimate 
end  than  to  take  care  of  the  people. 

We  know  of  but  one  solution  of  the  difficulty,  and  that  is  in 
RELIGION.  There  is  no  foundation  for  virtue  but  in  religion,  and 
it  is  only  religion  that  can  command  the  degree  of  popular  vir- 
tue and  intelligence  requisite  to  insure  to  popular  government 
the  right  direction  and  a  wise  and  just  administration.  A  peo- 
ple without  religion,  however  successful  they  may  be  in  throwing 
off  old  institutions,  or  in  introducing  new  ones,  have  no  power 
to  secure  the  free,  orderly,  and  wholesome  working  of  any  insti- 
tutions. For  the  people  can  bring  to  the  support  of  institutions 
only  the  degree  of  virtue  and  intelligence  they  have ;  and  wc 
need  not  stop  to  prove  that  an  infidel  people  can  have  very  little 
either  of  virtue  or  intelligence,  since,  in  this  professedly  Christian 
country,  this  will  and  must  be  conceded  us.  We  shall,  there- 
fore, assume,  without  stopping  to  defend  our  assumption,  that 
relio-ion  is  the  power  or  influence  we  need  to  take  care  of  the 
people,  and  secure  the  degree  of  virtue  and  intelligence  neces- 
sary to  sustain  popular  hberty.\  We  say,  then,  if  democracy 
commits  the  government  to  the  people  to  be  taken  care  of,  reli- 


TO    DEMOCRACY.  3*73 

gion  is  to  take  care  that  tliey  take  proper  care  of  the  govern- 
ment, rightly  direct  and  wisely  administer  it. 

But  what  religion  ?  It  must  be  a  religion  which  is  above  the 
people  and  controls  them,  or  it  will  not  answer  the  purpose.  If 
it  depends  on  the  people,  if  the  people  are  to  take  care  of  it,  to 
say  what  it  shall  be,  w^hat  it  shall  teach,  what  it  shall  command, 
what  worship  or  discipline  it  shall  insist  on  being  observed,  we 
are  back  in  our  old  difficulty.  The  people  take  care  of  religion ; 
but  who  or  what  is  to  take  care  of  the  people  ?  We  repeat, 
then,  what  religion  ?  It  cannot  be  Protestantism,  in  all  or  any 
of  its  forms  ;  for  Protestantism  assumes  as  its  point  of  departure 
that  Almighty  God  has  indeed  given  us  a  religion,  but  has  given^^ 
it  to  us  not  to  take  care  of  us,  hut  to  he  taken  care  of  hy  us^^  ^ 
It  makes  religion  the  ward  of  the  people ;  assumes  it  to  be  sent 
on  earth  a  lone  and  helpless  orphan,  to  be  taken  in  by  the  peo- 
ple, who  are  to  serve  as  its  nurse. 

We  do  not  pretend  that  Protestants  say  this  in  just  so  many 
words ;  but  this,  under  the  present  point  of  view,  is  their  dis- 
tinguishing characteristic.  What  was  the  assumption  of  the 
Reformers  ?  Was  it  not  that  Almighty  God  had  failed  to  take 
care  of  his  Church,  that  he  had  suffered  it  to  become  exceeding- 
ly corrupt  and  corrupting,  so  much  so  as  to  have  become  a  very 
Babylon,  and  to  have  ceased  to  be  his  Church  ?  Was  it  not 
for  this  reason  that  they  turned  reformers,  separated  themselves 
from  what  had  been  the  Church,  and  attempted,  with  such  ma- 
terials as  they  could  command,  to  reconstruct  the  Church  on  its 
primitive  foundation,  and  after  the  primitive  model  ?  Is  not 
this  what  they  tell  us  ?  But  if  they  had  beheved  the  Son  of 
Man  came  to  minister  and  not  to  be  ministered  unto,  that  i\l- 
mighty  God  had  instituted  his  religion  for  the  spiritual  govern- 
ment of  men,  and  charged  himself  with  the  care  and  mainte- 
nance of  it,  would  they  ever  have  dared  to  take  upon  themselves 
the  work  of  reforming  it  ?  Would  they  ever  have  fancied  that 
either  rehgion  or  the  Church  could  ever  need  reforming,  or, 
if  so,  that  it  could  ever  be  done  by  human  agency  ?     Of  course 


874  CATHOLICITY    NECESSARY 

not  They  would  have  taken  religion  as  presented  by  the 
Church  as  the  standard,  submitted  to  it  as  the  law,  and  confin- 
ed tliemselves  to  the  duty  of  obedience.  It  is  evident,  there- 
fore, from  the  foct  of  their  assuming  to  be  reformers,  that  they, 
consciously  or  unconsciously,  regarded  reHgion  as  committed  to 
their  care,  or  abandoned  to  their  protection.  They  Avere,  at  least, 
its  guardians,  and  were  to  govern  it,  instead  of  being  governed 
by  it. 

I  he  first  stage  of  Protestantism  was  to  place  religion  under  the 
charge  of  the  civil  government.  The  Church  was  condemned, 
among  other  reasons,  for  the  control  it  exercised  over  princes  and 
nobles,  that  is,  over  the  temporal  power ;  and  the  first  eflfect  of 
Protestantism  was  to  emancipate  the  government  from  this  con- 
trol, or,  in  other  words,  to  free  the  government  from  the  restraints 
of  religion,  and  to  bring  religion  in  subjection  to  the  temporal 
authority.  The  prince,  by  rejecting  the  authority  of  the  Church, 
won  for  himself  the  power  to  determine  the  faith  of  his  subjects, 
to  appoint  its  teaohers,  and  to  remove  them  whenever  they 
should  teach  what  he  disapproved,  or  whenever  they  should 
cross  his  ambition,  defeat  his  oppressive  policy,  or  interfere  with 
his  pleasures.  Thus  was  it  and  still  is  it  with  the  Protestant 
princes  in  Germany,  with  the  temporal  authority  in  Denmark, 
Sweden,  England,  Russia, — in  this  respect  also  Protestant, — and 
originally  was  it  the  same  in  this  country.  The  supreme  civil 
magistrate  makes  himself  sovereign  pontiflf,  and  religion  and  the 
Church,  if  disobedient  to  his  will,  are  to  be  turned  out  of  house 
and  home,  or  dragooned  into  submission.  Now,  if  we  adopt  this 
view,  and  subject  religion  to  the  civil  government,  it  will  not 
answer  our  purpose.  We  want  religion,  as  we  have  seen,  to 
control  the  people,  and  through  its  spiritual  governance  to  cause 
them  to  give  the  temporal  government  always  a  wise  and  just 
direction.  But,  if  the  government  control  the  religion,  it  can 
exercise  no  control  over  the  sovereign  people,  for  they  control 
the  government.  Through  the  government  the  people  take 
care  of  rehgion,  but  who  or  what  takes  care  of  the  people? 
This  would  leave  the  people  ultimate,  and  we  have  no  security 


TO    DEMOCRACY. 


375 


unless  we  have  something  more  ultimate  than  they,  something 
which  they  cannot  control,  but  which  they  must  obey. 

The  second  stage  in  Protestantism  is  to  reject,  in  matters  of 
religion,  the  authority  of  the  temporal  government,  and  to  sub- 
ject religion  to  the  control  of  the  faithful.  This  is  the  full  re- 
cognition in  matters  of  religion  of  the  democratic  principle. 
The  people  determine  their  faith  and  worship,  select,  sustain,  or 
dismiss  their  own  religious  teachers.  They  who  are  to  be  taught 
judge  him  who  is  to  teach,  and  say  whether  he  teaches  them 
truth  or  falsehood,  wholesome  doctrine  or  unwholesome.  The 
patient  directs  the  physican  what  to  prescribe.  This  is  the  the- 
ory adopted  by  Protestants  generally  in  this  country.  The  con- 
gregation select  their  own  teacher,  unless  it  be  among  the 
Methodists,  and  to  them  the  pastor  is  responsible.  If  he  teaches 
to  suit  them,  well  and  good ;  if  he  crosses  none  of  their  wishes, 
enlarges  their  numbers,  and  thus  lightens  their  taxes  and  grati- 
fies their  pride  of  sect,  also  well  and  good ;  if  not,  he  must  seek 
a  flock  to  feed  somewhere  else. 

But  this  view  will  no  more  answer  our  purpose  than  the  form- 
er ;  for  it  places  religion  under  the  control  of  the  people,  and 
therefore  in  the  same  category  with  the  government  itself.  The 
people  take  care  of  rehgion,  but  wdio  takes  care  of  the  people. 

The  third  and  last  stage  of  Protestantism  is  Individualism. 
This  leaves  religion  entirely  to  the  control  of  the  individual,  who 
selects  his  own  creed,  or  makes  a  creed  to  suit  himself,  devises 
his  own  worship  and  discipline,  and  submits  to  no  restraints  but 
such  as  are  self-imposed.  This  makes  a  man's  rehgion  the  ef- 
fect of  his  virtue  and  intelligence,  and  denies  it  all  power  to 
augment  or  to  direct  them.  So  this  will  not  answer.  The  in- 
dividual takes  care  of  his  religion,  but  who  or  what  takes  care 
of  the  individual?  The  state?  But  who  takes  care  of  the 
state  ?  The  people  ?  But  who  taJ^es  care  of  the  people  ?  Our 
old  diflBculty  again. 

It  is  evident,  from  these  considerations,  that  Protestantism  is 
not  and  cannot  be  the  religion  to  sustain  democracy ;  because, 
take  it  in  which  stage  you  will,  it,  like  democracy  itself,  is  subject 


376 


CATHOLICITY    NECESSARY 


to  the  control  of  the  people,  and  must  command  and  teach  what 
they  say,  and  of  course  must  follow,  instead  of  controlling,  their 
passions,  interests,  and  caprices. 

Nor  do  we  obtain  this  conclusion  merely  by  reasoning.  It  is 
sustained  by  facts.  The  Protestant  religion  is  everywhere  either 
an  expression  of  the  government  or  of  the  people,  and  ipust 
obey  either  the  government  or  public  opinion.  The  grand  re- 
form, if  reform  it  was,  effected  by  the  Protestant  chiefs,  consisted 
in  bringing  religious  questions  before  the  public,  and  subjecting 
faith  and  worship  to  the  decision  of  public  opinion, — public  on 
a  larger  or  smaller  scale,  that  is,  of  the  nation,  the  province,  or 
the  sect.  Protestant  faith  and  worship  tremble  as  readily  before 
the  slightest  breath  of  public  sentiment,  as  the  aspen  leaf  before 
the  gentle  zej)hyr.  The  faith  and  discipline  of  a  sect  take  any 
and  every  direction  the  public  opinion  of  that  sect  demands. 
All  is  loose,  floating, — is  here  to-day,  is  there  to-morrow,  and, 
next  day,  may  be  nowhere.  The  holding  of  slaves  is  compati- 
ble with  Christian  character  south  of  a  geographical  line,  and 
incompatible  north ;  and  Christian  morals  change  according  to 
the  prejudices,  interests,  or  habits  of  the  people, — as  evinced  by 
the  recent  divisions  in  our  own  country  among  the  Baptists  and 
Methodists.  The  Unitarians  of  Savannah  refuse  to  hear  a  preacher 
accredited  by  Unitarians  of  Boston. 

The  great  danger  in  our  country  is  from  the  predominance 
of  material  interests.  Democracy  has  a  direct  tendency  to  favor 
inequality  and  injustice.  The  government  must  obey  the  peo- 
ple ;  that  is,  it  must  follow  the  passions  and  interests  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  of  course  the  stronger  passions  and  interests.  These 
with  us  are  material,  such  as  pertain  solely  to  this  life  and  this 
world.  What  our  people  demand  of  government  is,  that  it 
adopt  and  sustain  such  measures  as  tend  most  directly  to  facili- 
tate the  acquisition  of  wealth.  It  must,  then,  follow  the  passion 
for  wealth,  and  labor  especially  to  promote  worldly  interests. 

But  among  these  worldly  interests,  some  are  stronger  than 
others,  and  can  command  the  government.  These  will  take 
possession  of  the  government,  and  wield  it  for  their  own  especial 


TO    DEMOCRACY. 


311 


advantage.  Tliey  will  make  it  the  instrument  of  taxing  all  the 
other  interests  of  the  countr}'  for  the  sj^ecial  advancement  of 
themselves.  This  leads  to  inequality  and  injustice,  which  are 
incompatible  with  the  free,  orderly,  and  wholesome  working  of 
the  government. 

Now,  what  is  wanted  is  some  power  to  prevent  this,  to  mod- 
erate the  passion  for  wealth,  and  to  inspire  the  people  with  such 
a  true  and  firm  sense  of  justice,  as  will  prevent  any  one  interest 
from  struggling  to  advance  itself  at  the  expense  of  another. 
Without  this  the  stronger  material  interests  predominate,  make 
the  government  the  means  of  securing  their  predominance,  and 
of  extending  it  by  the  burdens  which,  through  the  government, 
they  are  able  to  impose  on  the  weaker  interests  of  the  country. 

The  framers  of  our  government  foresaw  this  evil,  and  thought 
to  guard  against  it  by  a  written  Constitution.  But  they  in- 
trusted the  preservation  of  the  Constitution  to  the  care  of  the 
people,  which  was  as  wise  as  to  lock  up  your  culprit  in  prison 
and  intrust  him  with  the  key.  The  Constitution,  as  a  restraint 
on  the  will  of  the  people  or  the  governing  majority,  is  already  a 
dead  letter.  It  answers  to  talk  about,  to  declaim  about,  in  elec- 
tioneering speeches,  and  even  as  a  theme  of  newspaper  leadei*s, 
and  political  essays  in  reviews;  but  its  eflfective  power  is  a 
morning  vapor  after  the  sun  is  well  up. 

Even  Mr.  Calhoun's  theory  of  the  Constitution,  which  regards 
it  not  simply  as  the  written  instrument,  but  as  the  disposition 
or  the  constitution  of  the  people  into  sovereign  states  united  in 
a  federal  league  or  compact,  for  certain  purposes  which  concern 
all  the  states  alike,  and  from  which  it  follows  that  any  measure 
unequal  in  its  bearing,  or  oppressive  upon  any  portion  of  the 
confederacy,  is  ipso  facto  null  and  void,  and  may  be  vetoed  by  the 
agoTieved  state, — this  theory,  if  true,  is  yet  insufficient ;  because, 
1.  It  has  no  application  within  the  State  governments  them- 
selves ;  and  because,  2.  It  does  not,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  arrest 
what  are  regarded  as  the  unequal,  unjust,  and  oppressive  meas- 
ures of  the  Federal  government.  South  Carolina,  in  1833, 
forced  a  compromise,  but  in  1842,  the  obnoxious  policy  was 


878  >.%  CATHOLICITY    NECESSARY 

revived,  is  pursued  now  successfuDj,  and  there  is  no  State  to 
attempt  again  the  virtue  of  State  interposition.  Not  even  South 
Carohna  can  be  brought  to  do  so  again.  The  meshes  of  trade 
and  commerce  are  so  spread  over  the  whole  land,  the  control- 
hng  influences  of  all  sections  have  become  so  united  and  inter- 
woven, by  means  of  banks,  other  moneyed  corporations,  and  the 
credit  system,  that  henceforth  State  interposition  becomes  prac- 
ticall}''  impossible.  The  Constitution  is  practically  abolished, 
and  our  government  is  virtually,  to  all  intents  and  purposes,  as 
we  have  said,  a  pure  democracy,  with  nothing  to  prevent  it 
from  obeying  the  interest  or  interests  which  for  the  time  being 
can  succeed  in  commanding  it.  This,  as  the  Hon.  Caleb  Gush- 
ing would  say,  is  a  "  fixed  fact."  There  is  no  restraint  on  pre- 
dominating passions  and  interests  but  in  religion.  This  is  an- 
other "  fixed  fact." 

Protestantism  is  insufficient  to  restrain  these,  for  it  does  not 
do  it,  and  is  itself  carried  away  by  them.  The  Protestant  sect 
governs  its  religion,  instead  of  being  governed  by  it.  If  one  sect 
pursues,  by  the  influence  of  its  chiefs,  a  policy  in  opposition  to 
the  passions  and  interests  of  its  members,  or  any  portion  of  them, 
the  disaffc'cted,  if  a  majority,  change  its  policy  ;  if  too  few  or  too 
weak  to  do  that,  they  leave  it  and  join  some  other  sect,  or  form 
a  new  sect.  If  the  minister  attempts  to  do  his  duty,  reproves  a 
practice  by  which  his  parishioners  "get  gain,"  or  insists  on  their 
practising  some  real  self-denial  not  compensated  b}"  some  self- 
indulgence,  a  few  leading  members  will  tell  him  very  gravely, 
that  tiiey  hired  him  to  preach  and  pray  for  them,  not  to  inter- 
fere with  their  business  concerns  and  relations ;  and  if  he  does 
not  mind  his  own  business,  they  will  no  longer  need  his  services. 
The  minister  feels,  perhaps,  the  insult;  he  would  be  faithful; 
but  he  looks  at  his  lovely  wife,  at  his  httle  ones.  These  to  be 
reduced  to  poverty,  perhaps  to  beggary, — no,  it  must  not  be ; 
one  struggle,  one  pang,  and  it  is  over.  He  will  do  the  bidding 
of  his  masters.  A  zealous  minister  in  Boston  ventured,  one 
Sunday,  to  denounce  the  modern  spirit  of  trade.  The  next  day, 
he  was  waited  on  by  a  committee  of  wealthy  merchants  belong- 


TO    DEMOCRACY.  a  3Y9 

ing  to  his  parish,  who  told  him  he  was  wrong.  The  Sunday 
following,  the  meek  and  humble  minister  publicly  retracted,  and 
made  the  amende  honorable. 

Here,  then,  is  the  reason  why  Protestantism,  though  it  may 
institute,  cannot  sustain  popular  liberty.  It  is  itself  subject  to 
popular  control,  and  must  follow  in  all  thing-s  the  popular  will, 
passion,  interest,  ignorance,  prejudice,  oi'caprice.  This,  in  reality, 
is  its  boasted  virtue,  and  we  find  it  commended  because  under 
it  the  people  have  a  voice  in  its  management.  Nay,  we  ourselves 
shall  be  denounced,  not  for  saying  Protestantism  subjects  religion 
to  popular  control,  but  for  intimating  that  religion  ought  not  to 
be  so  subjected.  A  terrible  cry  will  be  raised  against  us.  "  See, 
here  is  Mr.  Brownson,"  it  will  be  said,  "  he  would  bring  the 
people  under  the  control  of  the  Pope  of  Ptorae.  Just  as  we  told 
you.  These  Papists  have  no  respect  for  the  people.  They  sneer 
at  the  people,  mock  at  their  wisdom  and  virtue.  Here  is  this 
unfledged  Papistling,  not  yet  a  year  old,  boldly  contending  that 
the  control  of  their  rehgious  faith  and  worship  should  be  taken 
from  the  people,  and  that  they  must  beheve  and  do  just  what 
the  emissaries  of  Rome  are  pleased  to  command ;  and  all  in  the 
name  of  liberty  too."  If  we  only  had  room,  we  would  write 
out  and  publish  what  the  anti-Catholic  press  will  say  against  us, 
and  save  the  candid,  the  learned,  intellectual,  and  patriotic  edit- 
ors the  trouble  of  doing  it  themselves ;  and  we  would  do  it  with 
the  proper  quantity  of  Italics,  small  capitals,  capitals,  and  ex- 
clamation points.  Verily,  we  think  we  could  do  the  thing  up 
nearly  as  well  as  the  best  of  them.  But  we  have  no  room.  Yet 
it  is  easy  to  foresee  what  they  will  say.  The  burden  of  their 
accusation  will  be,  that  we  labor  to  withdraw  religion  from  the 
control  of  the  people,  and  to  free  it  from  the  necessity  of  follow- 
ing their  will ;  that  we  seek  to  make  it  the  master,  and  not  the 
slave,  of  the  people.  And  this  is  good  proof  of  our  position, 
that  Protestantism  cannot  govern  the  people, — for  they  govern 
it, — and  therefore  that  Protestantism  is  not  the  religion  wanted ; 
for  it  is  precisely  a  rehgion  that  can  and  will  govern  the  people, 
be  their  master,  that  we  need. 


380  CATHOLICITY    NECESSARY 

If  Protestantism  will  not  answer  the  purpose,  what  reHgion 
will?  The  Roman  Catholic,  or  none.  The  Roman  Catholic 
religion  assumes,  as  its  point  of  departure,  that  it  is  instituted 
not  to  be  taken  care  of  by  the  people,  but  to  take  care  of  the 
people  ;  not  to  be  governed  by  them,  but  to  govern  them.  The 
word  is  harsh  in  democratic  ears,  we  admit ;  but  it  is  not  the 
office  of  religion  to  say  soft  or  pleasing  words.  It  must  speak 
the  truth  even  in  unwilling  ears,  and  it  has  few  truths  that  are 
not  harsh  and  grating  to  the  worldly  mind  or  the  depraved 
heart.  The  people  need  governing,  and  must  be  governed,  or 
nothing  but  anarchy  and  destruction  await  them.  They  must 
have  a  master.  The  word  must  be  spoken.  But  it  is  not  our 
word.  We  have  demonstrated  its  necessity  in  showing  that  we 
have  no  security  for  popular  government,  unless  we  have  some 
security  that  the  people  will  administer  it  wisely  and  justly  ;  and 
we  have  no  security  that  they  will  do  this,  unless  we  have  some 
security  that  their  passions  will  be  restrained,  and  their  attach- 
ments to  worldly  interests  so  moderated  that  they  will  never 
seek,  through  the  government,  to  support  them  at  the  expense 
of  justice  ;  and  this  security  we  can  have  only  in  a  religion  that 
is  above  the  people,  exempt  from  their  control,  which  tljey  can- 
not command,  but  must,  on  peril  of  condemnation  obey.  De- 
claim as  you  will ;  quote  our  expression, — the  people  must 
HAVE  A  master, — as  you  doubtless  will ;  hold  it  up  in  glaring 
capitals,  to  excite  the  unthinking  and  unreasoning  multitude,  and 
to  doubly  fortify  their  prejudices  against  Catholicity  ;  be  mortal- 
ly scandalized  at  the  assertion  that  religion  ought  to  govern  the 
people,  and  then  go  to  work  and  seek  to  bring  the  people  into 
subjection  to  your  banks  or  moneyed  corporations  through  their 
passions,  ignorance,  and  worldly  interests,  and  in  doing  so,  prove 
what  candid  men,  what  lovers  of  truth,  what  noble  defenders  of 
liberty,  and  what  ardent  patriots  you  are.  We  care  not.  You 
see  we  understand  you,  and,  understanding  3'ou,  we  repeat,  the 
religion  which  is  to  answer  our  purpose  must  be  above  tlie  peo- 
ple, and  able  to  command  them.  We  know  the  force  of  the 
word,  and  we  mean  it.     The  first  lesson  to  the  child  is,  obey  ; 


TO    DEMOCRACY.  381 

the  firet  and  last  lesson  to  the  people,  indmclualiy  or  collectively, 
is,  OBEY : — and  there  is  no  obedience  where  there  is  no  authority 
to  enjoin  it. 

CThe  Roman  Catholic  religion,  then,  is  necessary  to  sustain 
popular  liberty,  because  popular  liberty  can  be  sustained  only 
by  n  religion  free  from  popular  control,  above  the  people,  speak- 
ing from  above  and  able  to  command  them, — and  such  a  relig- 
ion is  the  Roman  Catholic.  It  acknowledges  no  master  but 
God,  and  depends  only  on  the  divine  will  in  respect  to  what  it 
shall  teach,  what  it  shall  ordain,  what  it  shall  insist  upon  as 
truth,  piety,  moral  and  social  virtue.  It  was  made  not  by  the 
people,  but  for  them  ;  is  administered  not  by  the  people,  but  for 
them  ;  is  accountable  not  to  the  people,  but  to  God.  i  Not  de- 
pendent on  the  people,  it  will  not  follow  their  passions  ;  not  sub- 
ject to  their  control,  it  will  not  be  their  accomplice  in  iniquity  ; 
and  speaking  from  God,  it  will  leach  them  the  truth,  and  com- 
mand them  to  practise  justice.  To  this  end  the  very  constitu- 
tion of  the  Church  contributes.  It  is  Catholic,  universal ;  it 
teaches  all  nations,  and  has  its  centre  in  no  one.  If  it  was  a 
mere  national  church,  hke  the  x\nglican,  the  Russian,  the  Greek, 
or  as  Louis  the  Fourteenth  in  his  pride  sought  to  make  the 
Gallican,  it  would  follow  the  caprice  or  interest  of  that  nation, 
and  become  but  a  tool  of  its  government  or  of  its  predominat- 
ing passion.  The  government,  if  anti-popular,  would  use  it  to 
oppress  the  people,  to  favor  its  ambitious  projects,  or  its  unjust 
and  ruinous  policy.  Under  a  popular  government,  it  would  be- 
come the  slave  of  the  people,  and  could  place  no.  restraint  on 
the  ruling  interest  or  on  the  majority ;  but  would  be  made  to 
sanction  and  consolidate  its  power.  But  having  its  centre  in  no 
one  nation,  extending  over  all,  it  becomes  independent  of  all, 
and  in  all  can  speak  with  the  same  voice  and  in  the  same  tone 
of  authority.  This  the  Church  has  always  understood,  and 
hence  the  noble  struggles  of  the  many  calumniated  popes  to 
sustain  the  unity.  Catholicity,  and  independence  of  the  ecclesi- 
astical power.  This,  too,  the  temporal  powers  have  always  seen 
and  felt,  and  hence  their  readiness,  even  while  professing  the 


882  CATHOLICITY    NECESSARY 

Catholic  faith,  to  break  the  unity  of  Catholic  authority  ,  for,  in 
so  doing-,  they  could  subject  the  Church  in  their  own  dominions, 
as  did  Henry  the  Eighth,  and  as  does  the  emperor  of  Russia,  to 
themselves. 

But  we  pray  our  readers  to  understand  us  well.  We  un- 
questionably assert  the  adequacy  of  Catholicity  to  sustain  popu- 
lar liberty,  on  the  ground  of  its  being  exempted  from  popular 
control  and  able  to  govern  the  people  ;  and  its  necessity^  on  the 
ground  that  it  is  the  only  religion,  which,  in  a  popular  govern- 
ment, is  or  can  be  exempted  from  popular  control,  and  able  to 
govern  the  people.  We  say  distinctly,  that  this  is  the  ground 
on  which,  reasoning  as  the  statesman,  not  as  the  theologian,  we 
assert  the  adequacy  and  necessity  of  Catholicity  ;  and,  we  object 
to  Protestantism,  in  our  present  argument^  solely  on  the  ground 
that  it  has  no  authority  over  the  people,  is  subject  to  them,  must 
follow  the  direction  they  give  it,  and  therefore  cannot  restrain 
their  passions,  or  so  control  them  as  to  prevent  them  fi-om  abus- 
ing their  government.  This  we  assert,  distinctly  and  intention- 
ally, and  so  plainly,  that  what  we  say  cannot  be  mistaken. 

But  in  what  sense  do  we  assert  Catholicity  to  be  the  master 
of  the  people  ?  Here  we  demand  justice.  The  authority  of 
Catholicity  is  spiritual,  and  the  only  sense  in  which  we  have 
here  ui-ged  or  do  urge  its  necessity  is  as  the  means  of  augment- 
ing the  virtue  and  intelligence  of  the  people.  We  demand  it  as 
a  religious,  not  as  a  political  power.  We  began  by  defining  de- 
mocracy to  be  that  form  of  government  which  vests  the  sover- 
eignty in  the  people.  If,  then,  we  recognize  the  sovereignty  of 
the  people  in  matters  of  government,  we  must  recognize  their 
political  right  to  do  what  they  will.  The  only  restriction  on 
their  will  we  contend  for  is  a  moral  restriction ;  and  the  master 
we  contend  for  is  not  a  master  that  prevents  them  from  doing 
politically  what  they  will,  but  who,  by  his  moral  and  spiritual 
influence,  prevents  them  from  willing  what  they  ought  not  to 
will.  The  only  influence  on  the  political  or  governmental  action 
of  the  people  which  we  ask  from  Catholicity,  is  that  which  it 
exerts  on  the  mind,  the  heart,  and  the  conscience ; — an  influence 


TO    DEMOCRACY.  383 

which  it  exerts  by  enhghtening  the  mind  to  see  the  true  end  of 
man,  the  relative  vahie  of  all  worldly  pursuits,  by  maierating  the 
passions,  by  weaning  the  affections  fi-om  the  world,  inflaming  the 
heart  with  true  charity,  and  by  making  each  act  in  all  things  seri- 
ously, honestly,  conscientiously.  Tlie  people  will  thus  come  to 
see  and  to  will  what  is  equitable  and  right,  and  will  give  to  the 
government  a  wise  and  just  direction,  and  never  use  it  to  effect 
any  unwise  or  unjust  measures.  This  is  the  kind  of  master  we 
demand  for  the  people,  and  this  is  the  bugbear  of  "  Romanism  " 
with  which  miserable  panders  to  prejudice  seek  to  frighten  old 
women  and  children.  Is  there  anything  alarming  in  this  ?  In 
this  sense,  we  wish  this  country  to  come  under  the  Pope  of 
Rome.  As  the  visible  head  of  the  Church,  the  spiritual  author- 
ity which  x\lmighty  God  has  instituted  to  teach  and  govern  the 
nations,  we  assert  his  supremacy,  and  tell  our  countrymen  that 
we  would  have  them  submit  to  him.  They  may  flare  up  at  this 
as  much  as  they  please,  and  write  as  many  alarming  and  abusive 
editorials  as  they  choose  or  can  find  time  or  space  to  do, — they 
will  not  move  us,  or  reheve  themselves  of  the  obligation  Al- 
mighty God  has  placed  them  under  of  obeying  the  authority  of 
the  Catholic  Church,  Pope  and  all. 

If  we  were  discussing  the  question  before  us  as  a  theologian, 
we  should  assign  many  other  reasons  why  Catholicity  is  neces- 
sary to  sustain  popular  liberty.  Where  the  passions  are  unre- 
strained, there  is  license,  but  not  liberty ;  the  passions  are  not  re- 
strained without  divine  grace ;  and  divine  grace  comes  ordina- 
rily only  through  the  sacraments  of  the  Church.  But  from  the 
point  of  view  we  are  discussing  the  question,  we  are  not  at  liber- 
ty to  press  this  argument,  which,  in  itself,  Avould  be  conclusive. 
The  Protestants  have  foolishly  raised  the  question  of  the  influ- 
ence of  Catholicity  on  democracy,  and  have  sought  to  frighten 
our  countrymen  from  embracing  it  by  appealing  to  their  demo- 
cratic prejudices,  or,  if  you  will,  convictions,  We  have  chosen 
to  meet  them  on  this  question,  and  to  prove  that  democracy 
without  Catholicity  cannot  be  sustained.  Yet  in  our  own  minds 
the  question  is  really  unimportant.     We  have  proved  the  insuf- 


384  CATHOLICITY    NECESSARY 

ficiency  of  Protestantism  to  sustain  democracy.  What  then  ? 
Have  we  in  so  doing  proved  that  Protestantism  is  not  the  true 
rehp-ion  ?  Not  at  all ;  for  we  have  no  infallible  evidence  that 
democracy  is  the  true  or  even  the  best  form  of  government.  It 
may  be  so,  and  the  great  majority  of  the  American  people  be- 
lieve it  is  so  ;  but  they  may  be  mistaken,  and  Protestantism  be 
true,  notwithstanding  its  incompatibihty  with  republican  institu- 
tions. So  we  have  proved  that  Catholicity  is  neccessary  to  sus- 
tain such  institutions.  But  what  then  ?  Have  we  proved  it  to 
be  the  true  religion  ?  Not  at  all.  For  such  institutions  may 
themselves  be  false  and  mischievous.  Nothing  in  this  way  is 
settled  in  fiivor  of  one  religion  or  another,  because  no  system  of 
politics  can  ever  constitute  a  standard  by  which  to  try  a  relig- 
ious system.  Religion  is  more  ultimate  than  politics,  and  you 
must  conform  your  politics  to  your  religion,  and  not  your  relig- 
ion to  your  politics.  You  must  be  the  veriest  infidels  to  deny 
this. 

This  conceded,  the  question  the  Protestants  raise  is  exceed- 
ingly insignificant.  The  real  question  is.  Which  religion  is 
from  God  ?  If  it  be  Protestantism,  they  should  refuse  to  sub- 
ject it  to  any  human  test,  and  should  blush  to  think  of  compel- 
ling it  to  conform  to  any  thing  human ;  for  when  God  speaks, 
man  has  nothing  to  do  but  to  listen  and  obey.  So,  having  de- 
cided that  Catholicity  is  from  God,  save  in  condescension  to  the 
weakness  of  our  Protestant  brethren,  we  must  refuse  to  consider 
it  in  its  political  bearings.  It  speaks  from  God,  and  its  speech 
overrides  every  other  speech,  its  authority  every  other  authority. 
It  is  the  sovereign  of  sovereigns.  He  who  could  question  this, 
admitting  it  to  be  from  God,  has  yet  to  obtain  his  first  religious 
conception,  and  to  take  his  first  lesson  in  religious  liberty ;  for 
we  are  to  hear  God,  rather  than  hearken  unto  men.  But  we 
have  met  the  Protestants  on  their  own  ground,  because,  though 
in  doing  so  we  surrendered  the  vantage-ground  we  might  occu- 
py, we  know  the  strength  of  Catholicity  and  the  weakness  of 
Protestantism.  We  know  what  Protestantism  has  done  for 
liberty,  and  what  it  can  do.     It  can  take  off  restraints,  and  in- 


TO    DEMOCRACY.  385 

troduce  license,  but  it  can  do  nothing  to  sustain  true  liberty. 
Catholicity  depends  on  no  form  of  government ;  it  leaves  the 
people  to  adopt  such  forms  of  government  as  they  please,  be- 
cause under  any  or  all  forms  of  government  it  can  fulfil  its  mis- 
sion of  training  up  souls  for  heaven ;  and  the  eternal  salvation 
of  one  single  soul  is  worth  more  than,  is  a  good  far  outweigh- 
ing, the  most  perfect  civil  liberty,  nay,  all  the  wordly  prosperity 
and  enjoyment  ever  obtained  or  to  be  obtained  by  the  whole 
human  race. 

It  is,  after  all,  in  this  fact,  which  Catholicity  constantly  brings 
to  our  minds,  and  impresses  upon  our  hearts,  that  consists  its 
chief  power,  aside  from  the  grace  of  the  sacraments,  to  sustain 
popular  liberty.  The  danger  to  that  liberty  comes  from  love 
of  the  world, — the  ambition  for  power  or  place,  the  greediness 
of  gain  or  distinction.  It  comes  from  lawless  passions,  from  in- 
ordinate love  of  the  goods  of  time  and  sense.  Catholicity,  by 
showing  us  the  vanity  of  all  these,  by  pointing  us  to  the  eternal 
reward  that  awaits  the  just,  moderates  this  inordinate  love, 
these  lawless  passions,  and  checks  the  rivalries  and  struggles  in 
which  popular  liberty  receives  her  death  blow.  Once  learn 
.hat  all  these  things  are  vanity,  that  even  civil  liberty  itself  is 
no  great  good,  that  even  bodily  slavery  is  no  great  evil,  that 
the  one  thing  needful  is  a  mind  and  heart  conformed  to  tlie  will  \ 
of  God,  and  you  have  a  disposition  which  will  sustain  a  democ- 
racy wherever  introduced,  though  doubtless  a  disposition  that 
would  not  lead  you  to  introduce  it  where  it  is  not. 

But  this  last  is  no  objection,  for  the  revolutionary  spirit  is  as 
fjital  to  democracy  as  to  any  other  form  of  governnj.-ni.  It  is 
the  spiiit  of  insubordination  and  of  disorder.  It  is  opposed  to  all 
fixed  rule,  to  all  permanent  order.  It  loosens  every  thing,  and 
sets  all  afloat.  Where  all  is  floating,  where  nothing  is  fixed, 
where  nothing  can  be  counted  on  to  be  to-morrow  what  it  is  to- 
day, there  is  no  liberty,  no  solid  good.  The  universal  restless- 
ness of  Protestant  nations,  the  universal  disposition  to  change, 
the  constant  movements  of  the  populations,  so  much  admired 
by  shortsighted  philosophers,  are  a  sad  spectacle  to  the  sober- 


386  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

minded  Christian,  who  would,  as  far  as  possible,  find  in  all 
things  a  type  of  that  eternal  fixedness  and  repose  he  looks  for- 
ward to  as  tlie  blessed  reward  of  his  ti-ials  and  labors  here. 
Catholicity  comes  here  to  our  relief.  All  else  may  change,  but 
it  changes  not.  All  else  may  pass  away,  but  it  remains  where 
and  what  it  was,  a  type  of  the  immobility  and  immutability  of 
the  eternal  God. 


LEGITIMACY   AND   REVOLUTIONISM. 

OCTOBER,    1848. 

We  take,  in  our  political  essays,  unwearied  pains  to  make  our- 
selves understood,  and  to  guard  against  being  misapprehended ; 
but,  through  our  own  fault  or  that  of  our  readers,  our  success 
has  rarely  corresponded  to  our  efforts.  On  all  sides,  from  all 
quarters,  we  are  charged  with  being  hostile  to  liberty  and  favor- 
able to  despotism, — the  enemy  of  the  people,  and  the  friend  of 
their  oppressoi-s.  We  could  smile  at  this  ridiculous  charge,  were 
it  not  that  some  honest  souls  are  found  who  appear  to  believe  it, 
and  some  moon-struck  sci'ibblers  make  it  the  occasion  of  excit- 
ing unjust  })rejudices  against  our  friends,  and  of  placing  them, 
as  well  as  ourselves,  in  a  false  position  before  the  public.  Injus- 
tice to  us  personally  is  of  no  moment,  and  demands  of  us  no 
attention:  but  when,  owing  to  our  peculiar  position,  it  can 
hardly  fail  to  work  injustice  to  others,  we  are  bound  to  notice 
and  to  repel  it. 

The  age  in  which  we  live  is  an  age  of  theoretical,  and,  to  a 
great  extent,  of  practical  anarchy.  Its  ideas  and  movements  are 
marked  by  impatience  of  restraint,  denial  of  law,  and  contempt 
of  authority.  We  have  seen  this,  and  have  felt  it  our  duty  to 
protest  against  it,  and  to  do  what  we  could,  in  our  limited  sphere, 
to  recall  men  to  a  sense  of  the  necessity  of  government,  and  to 
the  fact  of  their  moral  obligation  to  uphold  the  supremacy  of 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  387 

law.  This  is  our  offence.  Yet  one  would  naturally  suppose  that 
people  of  ordinary  intellio-cnce,  somewhat  acquainted  with  our 
past  history,  might,  without  much  difficulty,  believe  that  in  this 
our  motive  has  been  to  serve  the  cause  of  freedom,  not  that  of 
despotism.  We,  in  fact,  have  done  it,  because  liberty  is  impos- 
sible without  order,  order  is  impossible  without  government,  and 
government  in  any  worthy  sense  of  the  term  is  impossible  without 
a  settled  conviction  on  the  part  of  the  people  of  its  legitimacy, 
and  of  their  obligation  in  conscience  to  obey  it.  Nothino-  deserv- 
ing the  name  of  government  can  be  founded  on  the  sense  of  the 
agreeable  or  of  the  useful.  Governments,  so  called,  which  appeal 
to  nothing  higher,  more  catholic,  and  more  stable,  are  mere  crea- 
tures of  passion  or  caprice,  and  must  follow  the  lead  of  popular 
folly  and  excess,  instead  of  restraining  them,  and  directing  the 
general  acti\ity  to  the  public  good.  They  arc  not  governments, 
but  mere  instruments  for  the  private  gain  or  aggi-andizement  of 
the  adroit  and  scheming  few  who  contrive  to  possess  them-^elves 
of  their  management.  It  is  philosophically  and  historically  de- 
monstrable, that  the  permanence  and  stability  of  government,  and 
its  wise  and  just  administration  for  the  common  weal, — the  only 
legitimate  end  of  its  institution, — are  impracticable,  unless  the 
government  is  held  to  rest  on  the  universal  and  unalterable  sense 
of  duty,  under  the  protection  of  religion. 

This  truth,  though,  in  fact,  a  very  commonplace  truth,  our 
age  overlooks,  or,  if  it  does  not  overlook,  it  rejects.  Hence  the 
danger  with  which  liberty  in  our  times  is  threatfin  .1.  We  have 
believed  it,  therefore,  not  improper  to  guard  against  tliis  danger, 
and  in  order  to  do  so,  we  have  traced  government  back  to  its 
source,  and  to  the  foundation  of  its  authority.  We  have  found 
iLs  origin,  not  in  the  people,  but  in  God,  from  whom  is  all  pow- 
er ;  and  we  have  concluded  from  this  its  divine  right,  within  its 
legitimate  province,  to  our  allegiance.  It  has,  since  it  derives  its 
authority  from  God,  a  di^^ne  right  to  command,  and,  if  so,  we 
must  be  bound  in  conscience  to  obey  it.  Then  it  rests,  not  on 
the  sense  of  the  agreeable  or  of  the  useful,  to  fluctuate  as  these 
fluctuate,  but  on  tlie  sense  of  duty, — and  not  merely  duty  to  our 


388  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

coimtiy  or  to  mankind,  but  duty  to  God, — a  duty  founded  m 
the  unalterable  relations  of  man  to  his  Maker.  This  raises  polit- 
ical allegiance  and  obedience  to  the  law  to  the  rank  of  moral 
virtue,  and  declares  their  violation  to  be  a  sin  against  God,  to 
whom  we  belong,  all  we  have,  and  all  we  are.  Hence,  in  its  le- 
gitimate province,  even  civil  government  becomes  sacred  and 
inviolable ;  and  therefore  we  assert,  on  the  one  hand,  our  duty 
to  obey  it,  and,  on  the  other,  deny  the  right  of  revolution,  what 
Lafayette  calls  "  the  sacred  right  of  insurrection." 

Here,  in  general  terms,  is  the  doctrine  we  have  endeavored  to 
inculcate.  That  it  is  hostile  to  the  political  atheism  now  so  rife, 
we  concede.  We  are  Christians,  and  do  not  understand  the 
possibility  of  being  Christians,  and  yet  atheists  in  politics.  We 
have  but  one  set  of  principles,  and  these  are  determined  by  our 
religion.  We  cannot  adopt  one  set  of  principles  in  our  religion 
and  a  contradictory  set  in  our  politics,  saying  "  Good  Lord  "  in 
the  one,  and  "Good  Devil"  in  the  other.  We  are  too  far  be- 
hind the  age  for  that.  But  that  this  doctrine  is  hostile  to  liberty 
or  favorable  to  despotism,  we  do  not  concede, — nay,  positivelv 
deny.  In  setting  it  forth,  we  have  dwelt  on  that  phase  of  it  di- 
rectly opposed  to  the  dangerous  tendencies  of  the  age,  because 
it  was  not  necessary  to  guard  against  tendencies  from  which  we 
have  nothing  to  apprehend,  and  because  we  presumed  that  our 
readers  would  of  themselves  see  that  it  had  another  phase  equally 
opposed  to  the  opposite  class  of  tendencies.  But  for  the  hund- 
redth time  in  our  short  life  we  have  learned  that  the  writer  who 
presumes  any  thing  on  the  intelligence  or  discrimination  of  the 
bulk  of  readers  presumes  too  much,  and  will  assuredly  be  disap- 
pointed. The  doctrine  protects  the  government  against  radicals, 
rebels,  and  revolutionists ;  but  it  protects,  also,  the  people  against 
tyrants  and  oppressors.  The  fears  of  our  politicians  on  this  last 
point,  whether  real  or  affected,  do  little  credit  to  their  sagacity. 
The  monsters  which  affright  them  a  little  more  light  would  ena- 
ble them  to  see  are  as  harmless  as  the  charred  stump  or  decay- 
ing log  which  the  benighted  traveller  mistakes  for  bear  or 
panther.  ^ 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  389 

When  we  assert  the  doctrine  of  legitimacy,  we  are  imderstood 
to  assert  passive  obedience  and  non-resistance  to  tyrants;  but 
needs  it  any  extraordinary  intellectual  power  and  cultivation  to 
perceive  that  legitimacy,  while  it  smites  the  rebel  or  the  revo- 
lutionist, must  equally  smite  the  tyrant  or  usurper  ?  If  the 
doctrine  asserts  the  right  of  legitimate,  it  must  deny  the  right 
of  illegitimate  government ;  if  it  denies  the  right  to  disobey  the 
legitimate  authority,  it  must  also  deny  the  right  of  illegitimate 
authority  to  command  ;  if  it  disarms  the  subject  before  the  legal 
authority,  it  must  equally  disarm  the  illegal  authority  before  the 
subject.  How,  then,  from  the  fact  that  we  are  forbidden  to  re- 
sist or  to  subvert  legitimate  government,  the  legal  constitution 
of  the  state,  conclude  that  we  are  forbidden  to  resist  or  to  de- 
pose the  tyrant  ?  Tyranny,  oppression,  is  never  legal,  and  there- 
fore no  tyrant  or  oppressor  ever  is  or  can  be  the  legitimate  sov- 
ereign. To  resist  him  is  not  to  resist  the  legitimate  authority, 
and  therefore  demands  for  its  justification  no  assertion  of  the 
revolutionary  principle.  How  is  it,  then,  that  you  do  not  see 
that  the  doctrine  of  legitimacy  gives  a  legal  right  to  resist 
whatever  is  illegal,  and  therefore  lays  a  solid  foundation  for 
liberty  ? 

People,  we  know,  are  prejudiced  against  the  doctrine  which 
asserts  the  divine  origin  and  right  of  government,  but  it  is  be- 
cause they  m.isapprehend  the  doctrine,  and  because  they  identify 
liberty  with  democi-acy.  The  doctrine,  undoubtedly,  does  assert 
the  sacredness,  inviolability,  and  legitimacy  of  every  actual  poli- 
tical constitution,  whatever  its  form,  and  that  the  monarchical 
or  aristocratic  order,  where  it  is  the  established  order,  is  as  legit- 
imate as  the  democratic.  But,  if  liberty  and  democracy  are  one 
and  the  same  thing,  since  the  monarchical  order  is  that  which  is 
actually  the  estabhshed  order  in  most  states,  liberty  in  most 
states  is  precluded,  and  the  people  are  and  must  be  slaves. 
Yet  is  it  true  that  liberty  and  democracy  are  identical  or  con- 
vertible terms  ?  Democracy,  whose  expression  is  universal  suff- 
rage, intrusts  every  citizen  with  a  share  in  the  administration  of 
the  government,  which  is  and  can  be  done  by  no  other  political 


390  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

order  But  the  elective  franchise  is  a  trust,  not  a  right,  and 
therefore  to  withhold  it  is  not  to  withhold  freedom.  Liberty  is 
in  the  possession  and  exercise  of  our  natural  rights.  We  have 
none  of  us  any  natural  right  to  govern  ;  for  under  the  law  of 
nature  all  men  are  equals,  and  no  one  has  the  right  to  exercise 
authority  over  others.  The  franchise  is  a  municipal  grant,  and 
depends  on  the  will  of  the  political  sovereign.  Liberty,  unless 
the  question  be  between  nation  and  nation,  is  not  a  predicate  of 
the  government,  but  of  the  subject,  and  of  the  subject  not  in  his 
quality  of  a  constituent  element  of  the  sovereignty,  but  in  his 
quality  of  subject.  As  subject  he  may  be  free,  without  being 
intrusted  with  authority  to  govern,  and  therefore  may  be  free 
under  other  forms  of  government  than  the  democratic. 

In  fact,  democratic  politicians  never  attain  to  the  conception 
of  liberty.  The  basis  of  their  theory  of  government  is  despotism. 
They  make  the  right  to  govern  a  natural  i-ight,  and  differ  from 
the  confessedly  despotic  politicians  only  in  claiming  for  every 
man  what  these  claim  for  only  one.  They  make  government  a 
personal  right,  incident  to  manhood,  inalienable,  and  inamissible, 
— not  a  solemn  trust  which  the  trustee  is  bound  to  hold  and 
exercise  according  to  law,  and  for  which  he  is  accountable. 
Hence  it  is  that  democracy  always  sooner  or  later  terminates  in 
despotism  or  autocracy.  We  deny  that  government  is  ever  a 
personal  right,  whether  of  the  one,  the  few,  or  the  many,  and 
therefore  deny  that  a  man  has  a  natural  right  to  a  share  in  the 
administration.  He  only  has  the  right  to  whom  the  power  is 
delegated  by  the  competent  authority,  and  he  holds  it,  not  as  a 
personal  right,  but  as  a  trust.  Consequently,  we  do  not  concede 
that  the  establishment  of  the  democratic  regime  is  at  all  essential 
to  the  establishment  or  maintenance  of  liberty.  He  is  free,  en- 
joys his  liberty,  who  is  secured  in  the  possession  and  enjoyment 
(jf  all  his  natural  rights ;  and  this  is  done  wherever  the  legitimate 
authority  governs,  and  governs  according  to  the  principles  of 
justice.  We  are  aware  of  no  form  of  government  that  cannot 
so  govern,  or  which  cannot  also  govern  otherwise,  if  it  choose. 

We  are  republicans,  because  republicanism  is  here  the  estab- 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  391 

lished  order,  but  we  confess  that  we  do  not  embrace,  and  never 
Lave  embraced,  as  essential  to  liberty,  or  even  as  compatible 
with  liberty,  the  popular  democratic  doctrine  of  the  country. 
We  beg  leave  to  introduce  here  some  remarks  on  Democracy 
which  we  wrote  in  1837,  and  published  in  the  first  number  of 
The  Boston  Quarterli/  Review^  January,  1838. 

"  Democracy is  sometimes  asserted  to  be  the  sover- 
eignty of  the  people.  If  this  be  a  true  account  of  it,  it  is  in- 
defensible. The  sovereignty  of  the  people  is  not  a  truth.  Sover- 
eignty is  that  which  is  highest,  ultimate ;  which  has  not  only 
the  physical  force  to  make  itself  obeyed,  but  the  moral  right  to 
command  whatever  it  pleases.  The  right  to  command  involves 
the  corresponding  duty  of  obedience.  What  the  sovereign  may 
command,  it  is  the  duty  of  the  subject  to  do. 

"  Are  the  people  the  highest  ?  Are  they  ultim.ate  ?  And  are 
we  bound  in  conscience  to  obey  whatever  it  may  be  their  good 
plea.sure  to  ordain  ?  If  so,  where  is  individuariiberty  ?  If  so, 
the  people,  taken  collectively,  are  the  absolute  master  of  every 
man  taken  individually.  Every  man,  as  a  man,  then,  is  an  ab- 
solute slave.  "Whatever  the  people,  in  their  collective  capacity, 
may  demand  of  him,  he  must  feel  himself  bor.nd  in  conscience 
to  give.  Xo  matter  how  intolerable  the  burdens  imposed,  pain- 
ful and  needless  the  sacrifices  required,  he  cannot  refuse  obedi- 
ence without  incurring  the  guilt  of  disloyalty  ;  and  he  must  sub- 
mit in  quiet,  in  silence,  without  even  the^  moral  right  to  feel  that 
he  is  wronged. 

"  Now  this,  in  theory  at  least,  is  absolutism.  Whether  it  be 
a  democracy,  or  any  other  form  of  government,  if  it  be  abso- 
lute there  is  and  there  can  be  no  individual  hberty.  Under  a 
monarchy,  the  monarch  is  the  state.  '  L'Etat^c'est  moi,''  said 
Louis  the  Fourteenth,  and  he  expressed  the  whole  monarchical 
theory.  The  state  being  absolute,  and  the  monarch  being  the 
state,  the  rnonarch  has  the  right  to  command  what  he  will,  and 
exact  obedience  in  the  name  of  duty,  loyalty.  Hence  absolut- 
ism, despotism.  Under  an  aristocracy,  the  nobility  are  the  state, 
and  consequenly,  as  the  state  is  absolute,  the  nobility  are  also 
absolute.  Whatever  they  command  is  binding.  If  they  re- 
quire the  many  to  be  'hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water'  to 
them,  then  'hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of  water'  to  them 
the  many  must  feel  it  their  duty  to  be.  Here,  for  the  many,  is 
absolutism  as  much  as  under  a  monarchy.    Eveiy  body  sees  this. 


892  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

"  Well,  is  it  less  so  under  a  democracy,  where  the  people,  in 
their  associated  capacity,  are  held  to  be  absolute  ?  The  people 
are  the  state,  and  the  state  is  absolute;  the  people  may  there- 
fore do  whatever  they  please.  Is  not  this  freedom  ?  Yes,  for 
the  state ;  but  what  is  it  for  the  individual  ?  There  are  no 
kings,  no  nobilities,  it  is  true;  but  the  people  may  exercise  all 
the  power  over  the  individual  that  kings  or  nobilities  may ;  and 
consequently  every  man,  taken  singly,  is,  under  a  democracy,  if 
the  state  be  absolute,  as  much  the  slave  of  the  state,  as  under 
the  most  absolute  monarchy  or  aristocracy. 

"  But  this  is  not  the  end  of  the  chapter.  Under  a  democratic 
form  of  government,  all  questions  which  come  up  for  the  decis- 
ion of  authority  must  be  decided  by  a  majority  of  voices.  The 
sovereignty  which  is  asserted  for  the  people  must,  then,  be  trans- 
ferred to  the  ruling  majority.  If  the  people  are  sovereign,  then 
the  majority  are  sovereign  ;  and  if  sovereign,  the  majority  have, 
as  Miss  Martineau  lays  it  down,  the  absolute  right  to  govern. 
If  the  majority  have  the  absolute  right  to  govern,  it  is  the  abso- 
lute duty  of  the  minority  to  obey.  AVe  who  chance  to  be  in 
the  minority  are  then  completely  disfranchised.  We  are  wholly 
at  the  mercy  of  the  majority.  We  hold  our  property,  our  wives 
and  children,  and  our  lives  even,  at  its  sovereign  will  and  pleas- 
ure. It  may  do  by  us  and  ours  as  it  pleases.  If  it  take  it  into 
its  head  to  make  a  new  and  arbiti-ary  division  of  property,  Iiow- 
ever  unjust  it  may  seem,  we  shall  not  only  be  impotent  to  resist, 
but  we  shall  not  even  have  the  right  of  the  wretched  to  com- 
plain. Conscience  will  be  no  shield.  The  authority  of  the  ab- 
solute sovereign  extends  to  spiritual  matters,  as  well  as  to  tem- 
poral. The  creed  the  majority  is  pleased  to  imjwse,  the  minor- 
ity must  in  all  meekness  and  submission  receive;  and  the  form 
of  religious  worship  the  majority  is  good  enough  to  prescribe, 
the  minority  must  make  it  a  matter  of  conscience  to  observe. 
Whatever  has  been  done  under  the  most  absolute  monarchy  or 
the  most  lawless  aristocracy  may  be  reenacted  under  a  pure  dem- 
ocracy, and  what  is  worse,  legitimately  too,  if  it  be  once  laid 
down  in  principle  that  the  majority  has  the  absolute  right  to 
govern. 

"The  majority  will  always  have  the  physical  power  to  coerce 
the  minority  into  submission  ;  but  tliis  is  a  matter  of  no  mo- 
ment, in  comparison  with  the  doctrine  which  gives  them  the 
I'iglii,  to  do  it.  We  have  very  little  fear  of  the  i^liysical  force  of 
n umbel's,  when  we  can  oppose  to  it  the  moral  force  of  right. 
The  doctrine  in  question  deprives  us  of  this  moral  force.     By 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIOXISM.  393 

giving  absoluttj  sovereignty  to  the  majority,  it  declares  wliat- 
ever  the  majority  does  ■  is  right,  that  the  majority  can  do  no 
wrono-.  It  ho-itimates  every  possible  act  for  which  the  sanction 
of  a  majority  of  voices  can  be  obtained.  Whatever  the  major- 
ity may  exact  it  is  just  to  give.  Truth,  justice,  wisdom,  ^^rtue, 
can  erect  no  barriers  to  stay  its  progress  ;  for  these  are  the  crea- 
tions of  its  will,  and  may  be  made  or  unmade  by  its  breath. 
Justice  is  obedience  to  its  decrees,  and  injustice  is  resistance  to 
its  commands.  Resistance  is  not  crime  before  the  civil  tribunal 
only,  but  also  in  foro  conscientioe.  Now  this  is  what  we  protest 
against.  It  is  not  the  physical  force  of  the  majority  that  we 
dread,  but  the  doctrine  that  legitimates  each  and  every  act  the 
maiority  may  choose  to  perform  ;  and  therefore  teaches  them  to 
look  for  no  standard  of  right  and  wrong  beyond  their  own 
will 

"  The  effects  of  this  doctrine,  so  far  as  believed  and  acted  on, 
cannot  be  too  earnestly  deprecated.  It  creates  a  multitude  of 
demagogues,  pretending  a  world  of  love  for  the  dear  people, 
lauding  "the  people's  virtues,  magnifying  their  sovereignty,  and 
with  mock  humility  professing  their  readiness  ever  to  bow  to 
the  will  of  the  majority.  It  tends  to  make  public  men  lax  in 
their  morals,  hypocritical  in  their  conduct;  and  it  paves  the  way 
ior  gross  bribery  and  corruption.  It  generates  a  habit  of  ap- 
pealing, on  nearly  all  occasions,  from  truth  and  justice,  wisdom 
and  virtue,  to  the  force  of  numbers,  and  virtually  sinks  the  man 
in  the  brute.  It  destroys  manhness  of  character,  independence 
of  thought  and  action,  and  makes  one  weak,  vacillating,— a 
time-server  and  a  coward.  It  perverts  inquiry  from  its  legiti- 
mate objects,  and  asks,  when  it  concerns  a  candidate  for  office, 
not,  AVho  is  the  most  honest,  the  most  capable  ?  but.  Who  will 
command  the  most  votes  1  and  when  it  concerns  a  measure  of 
policy,  not.  What  is  just  ?  What  is  for  the  public  good  ?  but, 
What  can  the  majority  be  induced  to  support  ? 

"  Now,  as  men,  as  friends  to  good  morals,  we  cannot  assent 
to  a  doctrine  which  not  only  has  this  tendency,  but  w'hich  de- 
clares this  tendency  legitimate.  That  it  does  have  this  tendency 
needs  not  to  be  proved.  Every  body  knows  it,  and  not  a  few 
lament  it.  Not  long  since  it  was  gravely  argued  by  a  leading 
politician,  in  a  Fourth  of  July  oration,  that  Massachusetts  ought 
to  give  Mr.  Van  Buren  her  votes  for  the  Presidency,  because, 
if  she  did  not,  she  would  array  herself  against  her  sister  States, 
and  be  compelled  to  stand  alone,  as  the  orator  said  with  a  sneer, 
'  in  solitary  grandeur.'     In  the  access  of  his  party  fever,  it  did 


394  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

not  occur  to  him  that  Massachusetts  was  in  duty  hound,  wheth- 
er her  sister  States  were  with  her  or  against  her,  to  oppose  Mr. 
Van  Buren,  if  she  disliked  hira  as  a  man,  or  distrusted  his  prin- 
ciples as  a  politician  or  a  statesman.  Many  good  reasons,  doubt- 
less, might  have  been  alleged  why  Massachusetts  ought  to  have 
voted  for  Mr.  Van  Buren,  but  the  orator  would  have  been  puz- 
zled to  select  one  less  conclusive,  or  more  directly  in  the  face 
and  eyes  of  all  sound  morals,  than  the  one  he  adduced.  Ilie 
man  who  deserves  to  be  called  a  statesman  never  appeals  to 
low  or  demoralizing  motives,  and  he  scorns  to  carry  even  a 
good  measure  by  unworthy  means.  There  is  within  every  man, 
who  can  lay  any  claim  to  correct  moral  feeling,  that  which  looks 
with  contempt  on  the  puny  creature  who  makes  the  opinions  of 
the  majority  his  rule  of  action.  He  who  wants  the  moral  cour- 
age to  stand  up  '  in  solitary  grandeur,'  like  Socrates  in  the  face 
of  the  Thirty  Tyrants,  and  demand  that  right  be  respected,  that 
justice  be  done,  is  unfit  to  be  called  a  statesman,  or  even  a 
man.  A  man  has  no  business  with  what  the  majority  think, 
will,  say,  do,  or  will  approve ;  if  he  will  be  a  man,  and  main- 
tain the  rights  and  dignity  of  manhood,  his  sole  business  is  to 
inquire  what  truth  and  justice,  wisdom  and  virtue,  demand  at 
his  hands,  and  to  do  it,  whether  the  world  be  with  him  or 
fic;ainst  him, — to  do  it,  whether  he  stand  alone  '  in  solitary 
grandeur,'  or  be  huzzaed  by  the  crowd,  loaded  with  honors,  held 
up  ;ls  one  whom  the  young  must  aspire  to  imitate,  or  be  sneered 
at  tis  singular,  branded  as  a  '  seditious  fellow,'  or  crucified  be- 
tween two  thieves.  Away,  then,  with  your  demoralizing  and 
debasing  notion  of  appealing  to  a  majority  of  voices !  Dare  be 
a  man,  dare  be  yourself,  to  speak  and  act  according  to  your  own 
soleiim  convictions,  and  in  obedience  to  the  voice  of  God  calling 
out  to  you  from  the  depths  of  your  own  being.  Professions  of 
freedom,  of  love  of  liberty,  of  devotion  to  her  cause,  are  mere 
wind,  when  there  wants  the  power  to  live  and  to  die  in  defence 
of  what  one's  own  heart  tells  him  is  just  and  true.  A  free  gov- 
ernment is  a  mockery,  a  solemn  farce,  where  every  man  feels 
himself  bound  to  consult  and  to  conform  to  the  opinions  and 
will  of  an  irresponsible  majority.  Free  minds,  free  hearts,  free 
souls,  are  the  materials,  and  the  only  materials,  out  of  which 
free  governments  are  constructed.  And  is  he  free  in  mind, 
heart,  p^oul,  body,  or  limb,  he  who  feels  himself  bound  to  the 
triumphal  car  of  the  majority,  to  be  dragged  whither  its  drivers 
please  ?  Is  he  the  man  to  sjieak  out  tlie  lessons  of  truth  and 
wisdom  when  most  they  are  needed,  to  stand  by  the  right  when 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  395 

all  are  gone  out  of  tlie  way,  to  plead  for  the  wronged  and  down- 
trodden when  all  are  dumb,  he  who  owns  the  absolute  right  of 
the  majority  to  govern  ? 

"  Sovereignty  is  not  in  the  will  of  the  people,  nor  in  the  will 
of  the  majority.  Every  man  feels  that  the  people  are  not  ulti- 
mate, are  not  the  highest,  that  they  do  not  make  the  right  or  the 
wrong,  and  that  the  people  as  a  state,  as  well  as  the  people  as 
individuals,  are  under  law,  accountable  to  a  higher  authority 
than  theirs.  What  is  this  Higher  than  the  people  ?  The  king  ? 
Not  he  whom  men  dignify  with  the  royal  title.  Every  man,  by 
the  fact  that  he  is  a  man,  is  an  accountable  being.  Every  man 
feels  that  he  owes  allegiance  to  some  authority  above  him.  The 
man  whom  men  call  a  king,  is  a  man,  and,  inasmuch  as  he  is  a 
man,  he  nmst  be  an  accountable  being,  must  himself  be  under 
law,  and  therefore  cannot  be  the  highest,  the  ultimate,  and  of 
course  not  the  true  sovereign.  His  will  is  not  in  itself  law. 
Then  he  is  not  in  himself  the  sovereign.  Whatever  authority 
he  may  possess  is  derived,  and  that  from  which  he  derives  his 
authority,  and  not  he,  in  the  last  analysis,  is  the  true  sovereign. 
If  he  derive  it  from  the  people,  then  the  peojile,  not  he,  is  the 
sovereign ;  if  from  God,  then  God,  not  he,  is  the  sovereign. 

"  Are  the  aristocracy  the  sovereign  ?  If  so,  annihilate  the  aris- 
tocracy, and  men  will  be  loosed  from  all  restraint,  released  from 
all  obligation,  and  there  will  be  for  them  neither  right  nor 
wrong.  Nobody  can  admit  that  right  and  wrong  owe  their 
existence  to  the  aristocracy.  Moreover,  the  aristocracy  are  men, 
and,  as  men,  they  are  in.  the  same  predicament  with  all  other 
men.  They  are  themselves  under  law,  accountable,  and  there- 
fore not  sovereign  in  their  own  right.  If  we  say  they  are  above 
the  people,  they  are  placed  there  by  some  power  which  is  also 
above  them,  and  that,  not  the}',  is  the  sovereign. 

"  But  if  neither  people,  nor  kings,  nor  aristocracy  are  sover- 
eign, who  or  what  is  ?  What  is  the  answer  which  every  man, 
■when  he  reflects  as  a  moralist,  gives  to  the  question,  Why  ought 
I  to  do  this  or  that  particular  thing  ?  Does  he  say,  Because  the 
kiiij.^  commands  it, — the  aristocracy  enjoin  it, — the  people  or- 
dain it, — the  majority  wills  it  ?  No.  He  says,  if  he  be  true  to 
his  higher  convictions.  Because  it  is  right,  because  it  is  just. 
Every  man  feels  that  he  has  a  right  to  do  whatever  is  just,  and 
that  it  is  his  duty  to  do  it.  Whatever  he  feels  to  be  just  he 
feels  to  be  legitimate,  to  be  law,  to  be  morally  obligatory. 
Whatever  is  unjust  he  feels  to  be  illegitimate,  to  be  without  ob 
ligation,  and  to  be  that  which  it  is  not  disloyalty  to  resist.     The 


396  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

absolutist,  he  who  contends,  for  unquahfied  submission  on  the 
part  of  the  people  to  the  monarch,  thundei-s,  therefore,  in  the 
ears  of  the  absolute  monarch  himself,  that  he  is  bound  to  be 
just;  and  the  aristocrat  assures  his  order  that  its  highest  nobil- 
ity is  derived  from  its  obedience  to  justice  ;  and  does  not  the 
democrat,  too,  even  while  he  proclaims  the  sovereignty  of  the 
people,  tell  this  same  sovereign  people  to  be  just  ?  In  all  this, 
witness  is  borne  to  an  authority  above  the  individual,  above 
kings,  nobilities,  and  people,  and  to  the  fact,  too,  that  the  abso- 
lute sovereign  is  justice.  Justice,  is  then,  the  sovereign,  the 
sovereign  of  sovereigns,  the  king  of  kings,  lord  of  lords,  the  su- 
preme law  of  the  people,  and  of  the  individual. 

"This  doctrine  teaches  that  the  people,  as  a  state,  are  as  much 
bound  to  be  just  as  is  the  individual.  By  bounding  the  state  by 
justice,  we  declare  it  limited,  we  deny  its  absolute  sovereignty, 
and  therefore  save  the  individual  from  absolute  slavery.  The 
individual  may  on  this  ground  arrest  the  action  of  the  state,  by 
alleging  that  it  is  proceeding  unjustly:  and  the  minority  ha.s  a 
moral  force  with  which  to  oppose  the  physical  force  of  the  major- 
ity. By  this  there  is  laid  in  the  state  the  foundation  of  hberty  ; 
liberty  is  acknowledged  as  a  right,  whether  it  be  possessed  as  a 
fact  or  not. 

"  A  more  formal  refutation  of  the  sovereignty  of  the  people, 
or  vindication  of  the  sovereignty  of  justice,  is  not  needed.  In 
point  of  fact,  there  are  none  who  mean  to  set  up  the  sovereignty 
of  the  people  above  the  sovereignty  of  justice.  All,  we  believe, 
when  tlie  question  is  presented  as  we  have  presented  it,  will  and 
do  admit  that  justice  is  supreme,  though  very  few  seem  to  have 
been  aware  of  the  consequences  which  result  from  such  an  ad- 
mission. The  sovereignty  of  justice,  in  all  cases  whatsoever,  is 
what  we  understand  by  the  doctrine  of  democracy.  True  dem- 
ocracy is  not  merely  the  denial  of  the  absolute  sovereignty  of 
the  king,  and  that  of  the  nobility,  and  the  assertion  of  that  of 
the  people ;  but  it  is  properly  the  denial  of  the  absolute  sover- 
eignty of  the  state,  whatever  the  form  of  government  adopted  as 
the  agent  of  the  state,  and  the  assertion  of  the  absolute  sover- 
eignty of  justice 

"  Sovereignty  may  be  taken  either  absolutely  or  relatively. 
When  taken  absolutely,  as  we  have  thus  far  taken  it,  and  as  it 
ought  always  to  be  taken,  especially  in  a  free  government,  it 
means,  as  we  have  defined  it,  the  highest,  that  which  is  ultimate, 
which  has  the  right  to  command  what  it  will,  and  which  to  re- 
sist is  crime.     Thus  defined,  it  is  certain  that  neither  people,  nor 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  397 

kings,  nor  aristocrcacies,  are  sovereign,  for  they  are  all  under  law, 
and  accountable  to  an  authority  which  is  not  theirs,  but  which 
is  above  them  and  inde]3endent  of  them. 

"  When  taken  relatively,  as  it  usually  is  by  writers  on  govern- 
ment, it  means  the  state,  or  the  highest  civil  or  political  power 
of  the  state.  The  state,  we  have  seen,  is  not  absolute.  It  is 
not  an  independent  sovereign.  It  is  not,  then,  in  strictness,  a 
sovereign  at  all.  Its  enactments  are  not  in  and  of  themselves 
laws,  and  cannot  be  laws,  unless  they  receive  the  signature  of 
absolute  justice.  If  that  signature  be  witheld,  they  are  null  and 
void  from  the  beginning.  JSTevertheless,  social  order,  which  is 
the  indispensable  condition  of  the  very  existence  of  the  com- 
munity, demands  the  creation  of  a  government,  and  that  the 
government  should  be  clothed  with  the  authority  necessary  for 
the  maintenance  of  order.  That  portion  of  sovereignty  neces- 
sary for  this  end,  and,  if  you  please,  for  the  promotion  of  the 
common  weal,  justice  delegates  to  the  state.  This  portion  of 
delegated  sovereignty  is  what  is  commonly  meant  by  sovereignty. 
This  sovereignty  is  necessarily  limited  to  certain  specific  objects, 
and  can  be  no  greater  than  is  needed  for  those  objects.  If 
the  state  stretch  its  authority  beyond  those  objects,  it  becomes 
a  usurper,  and  the  individual  is  not  bound  to  obey,  but  may 
lawfully  resist  it,  as  he  may  lawfully  resist  any  species  of  injus- 
tice,— taking  care,  however,  that  the  manner  of  his  resistance  be 
neither  unjust  in  itself,  nor  inconsistent  with  social  order.  For  in- 
stance, the  state  assumes  the  authority  to  allow  a  man  to  be 
seized  and  held  as  property ;  the  man  may  undoubedetly  assert 
his  liberty,  his  rights  as  a  man,  and  endeavour  to  regain  them ; 
but  he  may  not,  in  doing  this,  deny  or  infringe  any  of  the  just 
rights  of  him  who  may  have  deemed  himself  his  master  or 
owner." — pp.  37-45. 

When  we  wrote  this,  we  had  the  reputation  of  being  one  of 
the  stanchest  friends  of  liberty  and  the  most  ultra  radicals  in  the 
country, — a  fact  which  we  commend  to  those  of  our  former 
friends  who  are  now  so  ready  to  represent  us  as  having  gone 
over  to  the  side  of  despotism.  We  should  not  now  call  the 
doctrine  of  the  extract  Democracy,  as  we  did  when  we  wrote  it, 
nor  should  we  use  certain  locutions,  to  be  detected  here  and  there 
in  the  extract,  dictated  by  an  erroneous  theology ;  but  the  doc- 
trine itself  is  our  present  doctrine,  as  clearly  and  as  energetically 


898  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

expressed  as  we  conld  now  express  it.  It  seems  to  us  to  contain 
an  unanswerable  refutation  of  the  popular  democratic  principle, 
and  a  triumphant  vindication  of  the  sovereignty  of  justice, — 
therefore,  of  the  divine  ongin  and  right  of  government ;  for  jus- 
tice, in  the  sense  the  writer  uses  it,  is  identical  with  God,  who 
alone  is  absolute,  immutable,  eternal,  and  sovereign  Justice. 

The  purpose  of  the  writer  was  evidently  to  obtain  a  solid 
foundation  for  individual  freedom.  If  he,  in  order  to  do  this, 
found  and  proved  it  necessary  to  assert  the  divine  origin  and 
right  of  government,  to  rise  above  the  sovereignty  of  kings,  of 
nobles,  and  even  of  the  people,  to  the  eternal  and  underived 
sovereignty  of  God,  King  of  kings,  and  Lord  of  lords,  how  should 
we  suspect  ourselves  of  being  hostile  to  liberty,  when  asserting 
the  same  doctrine  in  defence  of  the  rights  of  government  ? 
Having  for  years  proved  the  doctrine  to  be  favorable  to  liberty, 
how  could  we  believe  the  public  would  be  so  unjust  to  us  as  to 
accuse  us  of  favoring  despotism,  because  we  undertook  to  prove 
it  equally  favorable  to  civil  government  ?  Why  are  we  to  be 
classed  as  hostile  to  freedom,  because  we  defend  in  the  interests 
of  authority  the  doctrine  which  we  have  uniformly  asserted  as 
the  only  solid  foundation  of  freedom  ?  Whether  we  are  right 
or  wrong  in  the  doctrine  itself,  or  in  its  application,  would  it  be 
any  remarkable  stretch  of  charity  to  give  us  credit  for  believing 
ourselves  no  less  favorable  to  liberty  in  bringing  the  doctrine  out 
in  defence  of  authority,  than  we  were  in  bringing  it  out  in  defence 
of  the  rights  of  the  subject  ?  Are  liberty  and  authority  neces- 
sarily incompatible  one  with  the  other?  Or  is  it  a  blunder  to 
derive  both  from  the  same  source,  and  to  suppose  that  what  es- 
tablishes the  legitimacy  of  authority  must  needs  establish  also 
the  legitimacy  of  liberty  ? 

But  is  the  doctrine  of  the  divine  origin  and  right  of  govern- 
ment hostile  to  liberty  ?  If  government  derives  its  existence  and 
its  right  from  God,  it  can  have  no  power  but  such  as  God  dele- 
gates to  it.  But  God  is  just,  justice  itself,  and  therefore  can 
delegate  to  the  government  no  power  to  do  what  is  not  just. 
Consequently,  whenever  a  government  exercises  an  unjust  power, 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  399 

or  its  powers  unjustly,  it  exceeds  its  delegated  powers,  and  is  an 
usurper,  a  tyrant,  and  as  such  forfeits  its  right  to  command.  Its 
acts  are  lawless,  because  contrary  to  justice,  and  do  not  bind  the 
subject,  because  he  can  be  bound  only  by  the  law.  If  they  do 
not  bind,  they  are  null,  and  the  attempt  to  enforce  obedience  to 
them  may  be  resisted.  Is  it  difficult,  then,  to  understand,  that, 
while  the  doctrine  asserts  the  obligation  in  conscience  of  obe- 
dience to  legitimate  authority,  to  the  government  as  long  as  it 
does  not  command  any  thing  unjust,  it  condemns  all  illegal  au- 
thority, and  deprives  the  government  of  its  right  to  exact  obe- 
dience the  moment  it  ceases  to  be  just?  What  is  there  in  this 
liostile  to  liberty  ?  Is  my  liberty  abridged  when  I  am  required 
to  obey  justice  ?  If  so,  bo  good  enough  to  tell  me  whence  I 
obtain  the  right  to  do  wrong. 

Modern  politicians  assert,  in  opposition  to  the  sovereignty  of 
God,  the  sovereignty  of  the  people.  The  will  of  the  people  is 
with  them  the  ultimate  authority.  Is  it  they  or  we  who  are  the 
truest  friends  of  liberty  ?  Liberty  cannot  be  conceived  without 
justice,  and  wherever  there  is  justice  there  is  liberty.  Liberty, 
then,  must  be  secured  just  in  proportion  as  we  secure  the  reign 
of  justice.  This  is  done  in  proportion  to  the  guaranties  we  have 
that  the  will  which  rules  shall  be  a  just  will.  Is  there  any  one 
who  will  venture  to  institute  a  comparison  between  the  will  of 
the  people  and  the  will  of  God  ?  No  one  ?  Then  who  can 
pretend  that  the  doctrine  which  makes  the  will  of  the  people  the 
sovereign  is  as  favorable  to  liberty  as  the  doctrine  which  makes 
the  will  of  God  the  sovereign  ?  The  will  of  God  is  always  just, 
because  the  Divine  will  is  never  separable  from  the  Divine  rea- 
son ;  but  the  will  of  the  people  may  be,  and  often  is,  unjust,  for 
it  is  separable  from  that  reason,  the  only  fountain  of  justice. 
"VYe  make  the  government  a  government  of  law,  because  we 
found  it  on  will  and  reason ;  these  modern  pohticians  make  it 
one  of  mere  will,  for  they  have  no  assurance  that  the  will  of  the 
people  will  always  be  informed  by  reason.  By  what  right,  then, 
do  they  who  maintain  the  very  essence  of  despotism  charge  us 
with  being  hostile  to  liberty  ?     Wherefore  should  we  not,  as  we 


400  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

do  denounce  them  as  the  enemies,  nay,  the  assassins  of  Hbertj, — 
men  who  salute  her,  and  at  the  same  instant  smite  her  under  the 
fifth  rib? 

But,  it  is  gravely  argued,  if  you  deny  the  popular  origin  and 
right  of  government,  you  are  a  monarchist  or  an  aristocrat, 
We  deny  the  conclusion.  If  people  would  pay  a  little  attention 
to  what  we  actually  say,  before  conjuring  up  their  objections, 
they  would,  perhaps,  reason  less  illogically.  We  raise  no  ques- 
tion between  the  sovereignty  of  kings  and  nobles  and  that  of 
the  people.  What  we  deny  is  the  human  origin  and  right  of 
government.  We  deny  all  undelegated  sovereignty  on  earth, 
whether  predicated  of  the  king,  the  nobility,  or  the  people. 
The  question  we  are  discussing  lies  a  little  deeper  and  a  little 
farther  back  than  our  modern  politicians  are  aware.  They  are 
political  atheists,  and  recognize  for  the  state  no  power  above  the 
people ;  we  are  Christians,  and  hold  that  all  power,  that  is,  all 
legal  authority,  is  from  God ;  therefore  we  deny  that  kings,  no- 
bilities, or  the  people  have  any  authority  in  their  own  right,  and 
maintain  that  the  state  itself,  however  constituted,  has  only  a 
delegated  authority,  and  no  underived  sovereignty.  They  place 
the  people  back  of  the  state,  and  maintain  that  it  derives  all  its 
powers  from  the  people,  and  is  therefore  bound  to  do  their  will ; 
we  tell  them  that  the  people  themselves  are  not  ultnnate — have 
no  power  to  delegate,  except  the  power  which  Almighty  God 
delegates  to  them,  and  this  power  they,  as  trustees,  are  bound  to 
exercise  according  to  his  will,  and  are,  therefore,  not  free  to  exer- 
cise it  according  to  their  own.  They  are  desirous  mainly  of  get- 
ting rid  of  kings  and  nobles,  and,  to  do  so,  they  assert  the  sov- 
ereignty of  the  popular  will ;  we  wish  to  get  rid  of  despotism 
and  to  guard  against  all  unjust  government,  and  we  assert  the 
sovereignty  of  God  over  kings,  nobles,  and  people,  as  well  as 
over  simple  private  consciences.  Is  this  intelligible?  Who, 
then,  is  the  party  hostile  to  liberty  ? 

But,  reply  these  same  politicians,  we  do  not  mean  to  deny 
the  sovereignty  of  God ;  we  only  mean  that  the  authority  he 
delegates  is  delegated  to  the  people,  and  not  to  the  king  or  the 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  401 

nobility.  If  by  people  you  utderstand  the  people  as  tbe  nation 
with  its  political  faculties  and  organs,  and  not  the  people  as 
mere  isolated  individuals,  \vho  disputes  you  ?  Who  denies  that 
kings  and  nobilities  hold  their  powers,  if  not  from,  at  least  for, 
the  people,  and  forfeit  them  the  moment  they  refuse  to  exercisa 
them  for  the  common  good  of  the  people?  What  are  you 
dreaming  of?  Do  you  suppose  all  men  have  lost  their  senses 
because  you  have  lost  yours  ?  Who  born  and  brought  up  under 
a  republic,  who  acquainted  with  and  embracing  the  teachings 
of  Catholic  theologians,  b  likely  to  hold  the  slavish  doctrine,  that 
the  people  are  for  the  government,  not  the  government  for  the 
people  ?  Do  you  suppose  that  the  republican  and  Catholic  ad- 
vocate the  divine  right  of  kings,  and  passive  obedience,— the 
invention  of  Protestant  divines,  set  forth  and  defended  by  that 
pedantic  Scotchman,  the  so-called  English  Solomon  ?  Vv' ho  that 
has  meditated  on  the  saying  of  our  Blessed  Lord,  "  Let  him 
that  would  be  greatest  among  you  be  your  servant,"  can  hold 
that  a  prince  receives  power,  or  has  any  right  to  power,  but  for 
the  public  good  ?  We  do  not  deny  the  responsibility  of  kings 
and  nobles  to  the  nation,  or  that  the  nation  may,  under  certain 
circumstances,  and  obser\ing  certain  forms,  call  them  to  an  ac- 
count of  their  stewardship.  But  if  this  removes  your  objecticns 
to  our  doctrine,  it  by  no  means  removes  ours  to  yours.  We 
complain  of  you,  not  because  you  make  princes  responsible  t^ 
the  people,  that  is,  to  the  nation,  but  because  you  leave  the  peo- 
ple irresponsible,  and  make  them  subject  to  no  law  but  their 
own  will.  You  simply  transfer  the  despotism  from  the  one  or 
the  few  to  the  many,  and  deny  hberty  by  resting  in  the  arbi- 
trary will  of  the  people.  You  stop  with  the  people,  and,  if  you 
do  not  deny,  you  at  least  fail  to  assert,  the  sovereignty  of  God ; 
you  tell  them  their  will  is  sovereign,  without  adding  that  they 
have  only  a  delegated  sovereignty,  and  are  bound  to  exercise  it 
in  strict  accordance  with  and  in  obedience  to  the  will  of  God. 
Here  is  vour  original  sin.  On  your  ground,  no  provision  is 
made  for  liberty,  none  for  resistance  to  tyranny,  without  resort- 
in  o-  to  the  revolutionary  principle,  the  pretended  right  to  resist 


402  LEGITIMACY"    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

legitimate  government,  a  contradiction  in  terms,  and  alike  hos- 
tile to  liberty  and  to  authority.  On  our  ground,  the  right  to 
resist  tyranny  or  oppression  is  secured  without  detriment  to  le- 
gitimate government ;  because  the  prince  who  transgresses  his 
authority  and  betrays  his  trust  forfeits  his  rights,  and  having 
lost  his  rights,  he  ceases  to  be  sacred  and  inviolable. 

But  we  are  told,  once,  more,  that  practically  it  can  make  no 
difiference  whether  we  say  the  will  of  God  is  sovereign,  or  the 
will  of  the  people ;  for  the  will  of  the  people  is  the  true  expres- 
sion of  the  will  of  God,  according  to  the  maxim.  Vox  pojmli, 
vox  Dei.  We  deny  it.  The  will  of  God  is  eternal  and  im- 
mutable justice,  which  the  will  of  the  people  is  not.  The  peo- 
ple may  and  do  often  actually  do  wrong.  We  have  no  more 
confidence  in  the  assertion,  "The  people  can  do  no  wrong," 
than  we  have  in  its  brother  fiction,  "  The  king  can  do  no 
wrong."  The  people  must  be  taken  either  as  individuals  or 
as  the  state.  As  individuals,  they  certainly  are  neither  infallible 
nor  impeccable.  As  the  state,  they  are  only  the  aggregate  of 
individuals.  And  are  we  to  be  told,  that  from  an  aggregation 
of  fallibles,  we  can  obtain  infallibility  ?  Show  us  a  promise 
from  Almighty  God,  made  to  the  people  in  one  capacity  or  the 
other,  that  he  will  preserve  them  from  error  and  injustice,  be- 
fore you  talk  to  us  of  their  infallibility.  The  people  in  their 
collective  ca[)acity,  that  is,  the  state  popularly  constituted,  never 
surpass  the  general  average  of  the  wisdom  and  virtue  of  the 
same  people  taken  individually ;  and  as  this  falls  infinitely  below 
infallibility,  let  us  hear  no  more  of  the  infallibility  of  the  people. 
For  very  shame's  sake,  after  denying,  as  most  of  you  do,  the 
possibility  of  an  infallible  Church  immediately  constituted  and 
assisted  by  Infinite  Wisdom,  do  not  stultify  yourselves  by  com- 
ing forward  now  to  assert  the  infallibility  of  the  people.  If  the 
people  are  inftdlible,  what  need  of  constitutions  to  protect  mi- 
norities, and  of  contrivances  for  the  security  of  individual  liberty, 
which  even  we  in  our  land  of  universal  suffrage  find  to  be  in- 
dispensable ? 

But  we  return  to  our  original  position.     All  power  is  of  God. 


LEGITIMACY    A.ND    REVOLUTIONISM.  408 

T3v  liim  kings  reign  and  j:rinces  decree  just  things.  Govern- 
ment is  a  sacred  trust  from,  him,  to  be  exercised  according  to 
his  will,  for  the  public  good.  The  government  which  he  in  his 
providence  has  instituted  for  a  people,  and  which  confines  itself 
to  its  delegated  powers,  for  the  true  end  of  government,  is  le- 
gitimate government,  whatever  its  form,  and  cannot  be  resisted 
without  sin.  But  the  government  which  is  arbitrai'ily  imposed 
upon  a  people,  or  which  betrays  its  trust,  or  usurps  powers 
seriously  to  the  injury  of  its  subjects,  is  illegitimate,  and  has 
no  claim  to  our  allegiance.  Such  a  government  may  be  law- 
fully resisted,  and  sometimes  to  resist  it  becomes  an  imperative 
duty. 

But  who  is  to  decide  whether  the  actual  government  has 
transcended  its  powers,  and  whether  the  case  has  occurred  wlien 
we  are  permitted  or  bound  to  resist  it  ?  This  is  a  grave  ques- 
tion, because,  if  the  fact  of  illegitimacy  be  not  estabhshed  by 
some  competent  authority,  they  who  resist  run  the  hazard  of 
resisting  legitimate  govei:nment,  and  of  ruining  both  their  own 
souls  and  their  country.  Evidently  the  individual  is  not  to  de- 
cide for  himself  by  his  own  private  judgment ;  for  that  v/ould 
leave  every  one  free  to  resist  the  government  whenever  he  should 
choose,  which  would  be  whenever  it  should  command  any  thing 
not  to  his  liking.  If  he  had  the  right  thus  to  resist,  the  gov- 
er-nment  would  have  no  right  to  coerce  his  obedience,  and  there 
would  be  an  end  of  all  government.  Evidently,  again,  not  the 
people,  for  we  must  take  the  people  either  as  the  state,  or  as 
outside  of  the  state.  Outside  of  the  state  they  are  simple  indi- 
viduals, and,  as  we  have  seen,  have  not,  and  cannot  have,  the 
right  to  decide.  As  the  state,  they  have  no  faculties  and  no  or- 
gans but  the  government  which  is  to  be  judged,  and  therefore 
can  neither  form  nor  express  a  judgment.  Who,  then  1  Evi- 
dently the  power  whose  function  it  is  to  declare  the  law  of  God. 
Since  the  government  derives  its  authority  from  God,  and  is 
amenable  to  his  law,  evidently  it  can  be  tried  only  under  that 
law,  and  before  a  court  which  has  authority  to  declare  it,  and  to 
pronounce  judgment  accordingly. 


404  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

But  what  shall  be  done  in  case  there  be  no  such  court  of 
competent  jurisdiction  ?  We  reject  the  supposition.  Almighty 
God  could  never  give  a  law  without  instituting  a  court  to  declare 
it,  and  to  judge  of  its  infractions.  We,  as  Catholics,  know  what 
and  where  that  court  is,  and  therefore  cannot  be  embarrassed 
by  the  question.  If  there  are  nations  who  have  no  such  court, 
or  who  refuse  to  recognize  the  one  Almighty  God  has  establish- 
ed, that  is  their  affair,  not  ours,  and  they,  not  we,  are  responsible 
for  the  embarrassments  to  which  they  are  subjected.  They,  un- 
doubtedly, are  obliged  either  to  assert  passive  obedience  and 
non-resistance,  or  to  deny  the  legitimacy  of  any  government  .by 
asserting  the  right  of  revolution  ;  that  is,  they  have  no  alterna- 
tive but  anarchy  or  despotism,  as  their  history  proves.  But  this 
is  not  our  fault.  We  are  not  aware  that  we  are  obliged  to  ex- 
clude God  and  his  Church  from  our  politics  in  order  to  accom- 
modate ourselves  to  those  who  blaspheme  the  one  and  revile  the 
other.  We  are  not  aware  that  we  are  obliged  to  renounce  our 
reason,  and  reject  the  lessons  of  experience,  because,  if  we  admit 
them,  they  prove  that  Almighty  God  has  made  his  Church  es- 
sential to  the  maintenance  of  civil  authority  on  the  one  hand, 
and  of  civil  liberty  on  the  other, — because  they  prove  that  the 
state  can  succeed  no  better  than  the  individual,  without  religion. 
We  have  never  supposed  that  a  man  could  be  a  Christian  and 
exclude  God  from  the  state,  and  we  have  no  disposition  to  con- 
cede, or  to  undertake  to  prove,  that  he  can  be.  If  the  Church 
is  necessary  as  a  teacher  of  piety  and  morals,  she  must  be  neces- 
sary to  decide  the  moral  questions  which  arise  between  prince  and 
prince,  and  between  prince  and  subject,  and  to  maintain  the  con- 
trary is  only  to  contradict  one's  self  Politics  are  nothing  but  a 
branch  of  general  ethics,  and  ethics  are  simply  practical  theology. 
If  there  is  any  recognized  authority  in  theology,  that  authority 
must  have  jurisdiction  of  every  ethical  question,  that  is,  every 
question  which  involves  considerations  of  right  and  wrong,  in 
whatever  department  of  life  they  may  arise.  You  may  fight 
against  this  as  you  please,  but  you  cannot  change  the  unalterable 
nature  of  things.     It  is  useless  as  well  as  hard  to  kick  against  the 


LEGITIMACI'    AND    RP:vOLUTIONISM.  405 

pricks.  The  question  of  resistance,  presents  a  case  of  conscience,  a 
moral  question,  and  as  sucli  belongs  by  its  very  nature  to  the  spirit- 
uai  order,  and  then  necessarily  fells  under  the  jurisdiction  of  the 
legitimate  representative  of  that  order.  All  the  great  principles  of 
politics  and  law  are  ethical,  and  treated  as  such  by  both  Catholic 
and  Protestant  theologians.  How,  then,  can  we  dispense  with  the 
agency  of  the  Church  in  politics,  any  more  than  in  private  mor- 
als or  in  faith  itself?  And  are  we  to  forego  civil  government, 
are  we  to  submit  passsively  to  tyrants,  or  to  rush  into  anarchy, 
because  the  madness  or  blindness  of  others  leaves  them  no  other 
alternative  ?  Must  we  reject  or  refrain  from  using  the  infallible 
means  which  we  possess  for  determining  what  is  the  law  of  God, 
because  others  discard  them  and  attempt  to  get  on  without 
them  ?  Must  we  strip  ourselves  and  run  naked  through  the 
streets,  because  some  of  our  brethren  obstinately  persist  in  being 
Adamites  ?     Really,  this  were  asking  too  much  of  us. 

But  let  no  one  be  frightened  out  of  his  propriety,  for  we 
really  say  no  more  for  our  Church  than  every  sectarian  claims 
for  his  sect, — no  more  in  principle  than  was  claimed  last  year  by 
the  Presbyterians,  when  they  officially  condemned  the  Mexican 
war,  or  by  the  Unitarians,  when,  as  officially  as  was  possible  with 
their  organization  or  want  of  organization,  they  did  the  same.  The 
Church,  in  the  case  v>'e  have  supposed,  decides  only  the  morality 
or  immorality  of  the  act  done  or  proposed  to  be  done.  And  is 
there  a  Protestant  who  belongs  to  what  is  called  a  church  who 
does  not  take  his  church  as  his  moral  teacher  ?  When  Philip 
of  Hesse  found  his  wife  unsatisfactory  to  him,  and  wished  to 
take  unto  himself  another,  did  he  not  submit  the  question  to 
Luther  and  the  pastors  of  the  new  religion  ?  What  are  your 
Protestant  ministers,  if  not,  in  your  estimation,  among  other 
things,  teachers  of  morals  ?  And  in  case  of  doubt,  to  whom 
would  you  apply  for  its  resolution  but  to  your  church,  such  as  it 
is  ?  Do  you  say  you  would  not  ?  To  whom,  then  ?  To  your 
politicians  ?  What !  do  you  regard  politicians  as  safer  moral 
guides  than  your  pastors  ?  To  the  state  ?  So  you  hold  the 
Btiite  more  competent  to  decide  questions  of  morals  than  your 


40(5  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONT.SM. 

churcli !  But  the  state  is  the  party  accused ;  would  ;7ou  suffer 
it  to  be  judge  in  its  own  cause  ?  Then  you  arc  at  its  mercv. 
and  are  a  shive.  Trust  your  own  judgment?  But  you  are  a 
party  interested,  and  what  right  have  you  to  be  judge  in  your 
own  cause  ? 

The  fact  is,  every  man  who  admits  rehgion  at  all  must  admit 
its  jurisdiction  over  all  moral  questions,  whether  in  their  indi- 
vidual or  in  their  social  application,  and  therefore  does  and  must 
defer  in  them  to  that  authority  which  represents  for  him  the 
spiritual  order.  The  state  has  no  commission  as  a  teacher  of 
morals  or  as  a  director  of  consciences,  and  unless  you  blend 
church  and  state,  and  absorb  the  spiritual  in  the  temporal,  you 
cannot  claim  authority  for  the  state  in  any  strictly  moral  ques 
tion.  The  theory  of  our  own  institutions  is  the  utter  incompe- 
tency of  the  state  in  spirituals.  But  spirituals  include  necessa- 
rily every  question  of  right  and  wrong,  whether  under  the  natu- 
ral law  or  the  revealed  law, — a  fact  too  often  overlooked,  and 
not  sufficiently  considered  by  some  even  of  our  nominally 
Catholic  politicians  and  newspaper-writjrs  and  editors.  If  this 
be  so,  the  ligitimate  province  of  the  statj  is  restricted  to  matters 
which  pertain  to  human  prudence  and  .vocial  economy.  With- 
in the  limits  of  the  law  of  God,  that  is.  providing  it  violate  no 
precept  of  the  natural  or  revealed  law,  't  is,  as  we  have  said  in 
our  reply  to  Mr.  Thornwell,  independent  and  free  to  pursue  the 
policy  which  human  wisdom  and  prudence  suggest  as  best 
adapted  to  secure  the  public  good.  To  give  it  a  wider  province 
would  be  to  claim  for  it  a  portion  at  least  of  that  very  authority 
which  Protestants  make  it  an  offence  in  us  to  claim  even  for  the 
Church  of  God.  We  claim  here  no  direct  temporal  authority 
for  the  Church,  but  we  do  claim,  and  shall,  as  long  as  we  retain 
our  reason,  continue  to  claim  for  her,  under  God,  supreme  and 
exclusive  jurisdiction  over  all  questions  which  pertain  to  the 
spiritual  order. 

The  conservative  doctrine  which  we  have  contended  for,  and 
which  does  not  happen  to  ])lease  some  of  our  readers,  follows 
necessarily  from  this  doctrine  of  the  divine  origin  and  right  of 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  407 

gjovernment.  No  one  particular  form  of  government  exists  by 
divine  riglit  for  every  people,  but  every  form  so  exists  for  the 
particular  nation  of  which  it  is  the  established  order.  The  es- 
tablished order,  the  constitution  of  the  state,  which  God  in  his 
providence  has  given  to  a  particular  people,  which  is  coeval  with 
that  people,  has  grown  up  with  it,  and  is  identified  with  its  whole 
public  life,  is  the  legitimate  order,  the  legal  constitution,  and 
therefore  sacred  and  inviolable.  If  sacred  and  inviolable,  it  must 
be  preserved,  and  no  changes  or  innovations  under  the  name  of 
progress  or  reform,  that  would  abolish  or  essentially  alter  it,  or 
that  would  in  any  degree  impair  its  free,  vigorous,  and  healthy 
action,  can  be  tolerated. 

This  is  the  doctrine  we  have  maintained,  and  this  is  asserted 
to  be  hostile  to  liberty  and  favorable  to  despotism.  However 
this  may  be,  the  doctrine  is  not  a  recent  doctrine  with  us,  not 
one  wiiich  we  have  embraced  for  the  first  time  since  our  conver- 
sion to  Catholicity.  We  held  and  publicly  maintained  it  during 
that  period  of  our  life  when  we  were  regarded  as  a  liberalist, 
and  denounced  by  our  countrymen  as  a  radical,  a  leveller,  and 
a  disorganizer.  Thus,  in  October,  1S38,  w^e  oppose  it  to  the 
mad  proceedings  of  the  Abolitionists,  and  maintain  that  it  is  a 
sufficient  reason  for  condemning  those  proceedings,  that  thev 
are  unconstitutional  and  revolutionary. 

"  We  would  acquit  the  Abolitionists,  also,  of  all  wish  to 
change  fundamentally  the  character  of  our  institutions.  They 
are  not,  at  least  the  honest  part  of  them,  politicians  ;  but  very 
simple-minded  men  and  w^omen,  who  crave  excitement,  and  seek 
it  in  Abolition  meetings,  and  in  getting  up  x\bolition  societies 
and  petitions,  instead  of  seeking  it  in  ball-rooms,  theatres,  or 
places  of  fashionable  amusement  or  dissipation.  Politics,  prop- 
erly speaking,  they  abominate,  because  politics  would  require 
them  to  think,  and  they  wish  only  to  feel.  Doubtless  some  of 
them  are  moved  by  generous  sympathies,  and  a  real  regard  for 
the  well-beino-  of  the  Negro  ;  but  the  principal  moving  cause  of 
their  proceeding's,  after  the  craving  for  excitement,  and  perhaps 
notoriety,  is  the  feehng  that  slavery  is  a  national  disgrace.  Novv 
this  feeling,  as  we  have  shown,  proceeds  from  a  misconception 
of  the  real  character  of  our  institutions.     This  feeling  can  be 


408  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

justified  only  on  the  supposition  that  we  are  a  consohdated  re- 
pubHc.  Its  existence  is  therefore  a  proof,  that,  whatever  be  the 
conscious  motives  in  the  main  of  the  Abolitionist,  their  proceed- 
ings strike  against  our  Federal  system. 

"  Well,  what  if  they  do  ?  replies  the  Abolitionist.  If  Feder- 
alism, or  the  doctrine  of  State  sovereignty,  which  you  say  is  the 
American  system  of  politics,  prohibits  us  from  laboring  to  free 
the  slave,  then  down  with  it.  Any  system  of  government,  any 
political  relations,  which  prevent  me  from  laboring  to  break  the 
yoke  of  the  oppressor  and  to  set  the  captive  free,  is  a  wicked 
system,  and  ought  to  be  destroyed.  God  disowns  it,  Christ  dis- 
owns it,  and  man  ought  to  disown  it.  If  consolidation,  if  cen- 
traUzation,  be  the  order  that  enables  us  to  free  the  slave,  then 
give  us  consolidation,  give  us  centralization.  It  is  the  true  doc- 
trine. It  enables  one  to  plead  for  the  slave.  The  slave  is 
crushed  under  his  master's  foot ;  the  slave  is  dying ;  I  see  noth- 
ing but  the  slave  ;  I  hear  nothing  but  the  slave's  cries  for  deliv- 
erance. Away  with  your  paper  barriers  !  away  with  your  idle 
prating  about  State  rights  !  clear  the  way  !  let  me  run  to  the 
slave !  Any  thing  that  frees  the  slave  is  right,  is  owned  by 
God. 

"  We  express  here  the  sentiment  and  use  very  nearly  the  lan- 
guage of  the  Abolitionists.  They  have  no  respect  for  govern- 
ment as  such.  They,  indeed,  are  fast  adopting  the  ultra-radical 
doctrine,  that  all  government  is  founded  in  usurpation,  and  is  an 
evil  which  all  true  Christians  must  labor  to  abolish.  They  have, 
at  least  some  of  them,  nominated  Jesus  Christ  to  be  President 
of  the  United  States  ;  as  much  as  to  say,  in  the  only  practical 
sense  to  be  given  the  nomination,  that  there  shall  be  no  Presi- 
dent of  the  United  States  but  an  idea,  and  an  idea  without  any 
visible  embodiment ;  which  is  merely  contending,  in  other  words, 
that  there  shall  be  no  visible  government,  no  political  institutions 
whatever.  They  have  fixed  their  minds  on  a  given  object,  and, 
finding  that  the  political  institutions  of  the  country  and  the  laws 
of  the  land  are  against  them,  they  deny  the  legitimacy  of  all 
laws  and  of  all  political  institutions.  Let  them  carry  their  doc- 
trines out,  and  it  is  easy  to  see  that  a  most  radical  revolution  in 
the  institutions  of  the  country  must  be  the  result. 

"  Now,  we  ask,  has  a  revolution  become  necessary  ?  Is  it  no 
longer  possible  to  labor  for  the  progress  of  Humanity  in  this 
country,  without  changing  entirely  the  character  of  our  political 
institutions  ?  Must  we  change  our  Federal  system,  destroy  the 
existing  relations  between  the  States  and  the  Union  and  between 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  409 

the  States  themselves  ?  Nay,  must  we  destroy  all  outward,  vis- 
ible tvovernment,  abolish  all' laws,  and  leave  the  commuiiity  in 
the  s'tate  in  which  the  Jews  were,  wlien  '  there  was  no  king  in 
Israel,  and  every  man  did  that  which  was  right  in  his  own 
eyes  ? '  We  put  these  questions  in  soberness,  and  with  a  deep 
feeding  of  their  magnitude.  The  Abolition  ranks  are  full  of  in- 
sane dreamers,  and  fuller  yet  of  men  and  women  ready  to  un- 
dertake to  realize  any  dream,  however  insane,  and  at  any  ex- 
pense. We  ask,  therefore,  these  questions  with  solemnity,  and 
with  fearful  forebodings  for  our  country.  W^e  rarely  fe:U',  we 
rarely  tremble  at  the  prospect  of  evil  to  come.  The  habitual 
state"  of  our  own  mind  is  that  of  serene  trust  in  ttie  future  ;  and 
if  in  this  respect  we  are  thought  to  have  a  fault,  it  is  in  being 
too  sanguine,  in  hoping  too  much.  But  we  confess,  the  pro- 
ceedings of  the  Abolitionists,  coupled  with  their  vague  specula- 
tions and  their  crude  notions,  do  till  us  with  lively  alarm,  and 
make  us  apprehend  danger  to  our  beloved  country.  We  beg, 
in  the  name  of  God  and  of  man,  the  Abolitionists  to  pause,  and 
if  they  love  liberty,  ask  themselves  what  liberty  has,  in  the  long 
run,  to  gain  by  overthrowing  the  system  of  government  we  ha'ra 
established,  by  effecting  a  revolution  in  the  very  foundation  of 
our  Federal  system. 

"  For  ourselves,  we  have  accepted  with  our  whole  heart  the 

political  system  adopted  by  our  fathers We  take  the 

American  political  system  as  our  starting-point,  as  our  primitive 
data,  and  we  repulse  whatever  is  repugnant  to  it,  and  accept, 
demand  whatever  is  essential  to  its  preservation.  We  take  our 
stand  on  the  Idea  of  our  institutions,  and  labor  with  all  our  soul 
to  realize  and  develop  it.  As  a  lover  of  our  race,  as  the  devot- 
ed friend  of  liberty,  of  the  progress  of  mankind,  we  feel^  that  we 
must,  in  this  country,  be  conservative,  not  radical.  If  we  de- 
mand the  elevation  of  labor  and  the  laboring  classes,  we  do  it 
only  in  accordance  with  our  institutions  and  for  the  purpose  of 
preserving  them,  by  removing  all  discrepancy  between  their 
spirit  and  the  sociariiabits  and  condition  of  the  people  on  whom 
they  are  to  act  and  to  whose  keeping  they  are  intrusted.  We 
demand  reform  only  for  the  purpose  of  preserving  American  in- 
stitutions in  their  real  character ;  and  we  can  tolerate  no  changes, 
no  innovations,  no  alleged  improvements,  not  introduced  in 
strict  accordance  with  the  relations  which  do  subsist  betwceu 
the  States  and  the  Union  and  between  the  States  themselves. 
Here  is  om-  political  creed.  More  power  in  the  Federal  govern- 
ment than  was  given  it  by  the  Convention  wliich  framed  the 


410  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

Constitution  would  be  dangerous  to  the  States,  and  with  less 
power  the  Federal  government  would  not  be  able  to  subsist. 
We  take  ii,  then,  as  it  is.  The  fact,  that  any  given  measure  is 
necessary  to  preserve  it  as  it  is,  is  a  sufticient  reason  for  adopt- 
ing that  measure ;  the  fact,  that  a  given  measure  is  opposed  to 
it  as  it  is,  and  has  a  tendency  to  increase  or  diminish  its  power, 
is  a  sufficient  reason  for  rejecting  that  measure." — The  Boston 
Quarterly  Eeviezv,  1838,  Vol.  i.  pp.  492-495. 

The  same  doctrine  we  had  inculcated  in  the  Review  for  the 
previous  July  of  the  same  year. 

"Our  government,  in  its  measures  and  practical  character, 
should  conform  as  strictly  as  possible  to  the  ideal  or  theor\^  of 
O'jr  institutions.  Nobody,  we  trust,  is  prepared  for  a  revolyi- 
tion ;  nobody,  we  also  trust,  is  bold  enough  to  avow  a  wish  to 
depart  very  widely  from  the  fundamental -principles  of  our  insti- 
tution's; and  everybody  will  admit  that  the  statesman  should" 
stody  to  preserve  those  institutions  in  their  simplicity  and  in- 
tegTity,  and  should  seek,  in  every  law  or  measure  he  proposes, 
merely  to  bring  out  their  practical  worth,  and  secure  the  ends 
for  which  they  were  established.  Their  spirit  should  dictate 
every  legislative  enactment,  every  judicial  decision,  and  every 
executive  measure.  Any  law  not  in  harmony  with  their  genius, 
any  measure  which  would  be  likely  to  disturb  the  nicely  adjusted 
balance  of  their  respective  powers,  or  that  would  give  th</ra,  in 
their  practical  opei-ation,  a  character  essentially  different  from 
the  one  they  wei--i  originally  intended  to  have,  should  be  dis- 
countenanced, and  never  for  a  single  moment  entertained. 

"We  would  not  be  uudeiv-tocd  to  be  absolutely  o})posed  to 
all  innovations  or  changes,  whatever  their  charact-^r.  It  is  true, 
we  can  ne\er  consent  to  disturb  the  settled  order  of  a  state,  with- 
out strong  and  urgent  reasons ;  but  we  can  conceive  of  cases  in 
which  we.  should  deem  it  our  duty  to  demand  a  revolution. 
When  a  government  has  outlived  its  idea,  and  the  institutions 
of  a 'country  no  longer  bear  any  relation  to  the  prevailing  habits, 
thoughts,  and  sentiments  of  the  people,  and  have  become  a  mere 
dead  carcass,  an  encumbrance,  an  offence,  we  can  call  loudly  for 
a  revolution,  and  behold  with  comparative  coolness  its  teriible  do- 
ings. But  such  a  case  does  not  as  yet  present  itself  here.  Our 
institutions  are  all  young,  full  of  life,  and  the  future.  Here,  we 
cannot  be  revolutionists.  Here,  we  can  tolerate  no  innovations, 
no  changes,  which  touch  fundamental  laws.     Kone  are  fulmissi- 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  411 

ble  but  such  as  are  needed  to  preserve  our  institutions  in  their 
original  character,  to  brino-  out  their  concealed  beaut3%  to  clear 
the^  field  for  their  free  operation,  and  to  give  more  directness 
and  force  to  their  legitimate  activity.  Every  measure  must  be  in 
harmony  with  them,  grow,  as  it  were,  out  of  them,  and  be  but 
a  development  of  their  fundamental  laws." — Vol.  i.  pp.  334,  335. 

Undoubtedly,  we  here  recognize  a  case  in  which  a  revolution 
w^ould  bs  justifiable ;  but  not  a  case  in  which  it  would  be  law- 
ful to  subvert  the  constitution ;  for  the  case  supposed  is  one  in 
which  the  constitution  has  already  been  subverted,  and  ceased 
to  be  living  and  operative.  The  doctrine  is  nowise  different 
from  our  present  doctrine  on  the  subject,  only  what  we  called 
revolution  then  we  should  call  by  another  name  now.  The 
ino\ements  of  a  people  to  depose  the  tyrant,  to  throw  off  the 
illegitimate  and  to  restore  the  legitimate  authority,  are  not  a 
revolution  in  the  sense  in  which  we  deny  the  right  of  revolution. 
It  is  essential  to  our  idea  of  a  revolution,  that  it  should  involve, 
in  some  respect,  an  effort  or  intention  to  subvert  the  legal  au- 
thority of  a  state.  If,  for  instance,  it  be  conceded  that  Ireland 
is  an  integral  part  of  the  British  empire,  or,  rather,  of  the  Brit- 
ish state,  an  effort  on  the  part  of  Irishmen  to  sever  her  from  the 
British  state,  and  erect  her  into  an  independent  nation,  w^ould 
be  revolutionary  and  unjustifiable.  But  if  it  be  conceded  that 
she  is  a  separate  state,  that  she  has  never  been  merged  in  the 
British  state,  and  has  been  bound  to  it  only  by  a  mutual  com- 
pact, and  if  it  be  conceded  or  established  that  England  has 
broken  the  compact  or  not  complied  with  its  conditions,  a  like 
efifort  at  separation  and  independence  would  involve  no  revolu- 
tionary principle,  and,  if  prudent  or  expedient,  would  be  justi- 
fiable, even  though  it  should  lead  to  a  fearful  and  protracted  war 
between  the  two  nations. 

It  is  clear,  however,  from  these  extracts,  that,  as  long  ago  as 
1838,  we  were,  in  relation  to  our  own  country,  decidedly  con- 
servative. Here  is  another  extract  from  the  same  Review,  for 
October,  1841,  which  proves  that  we,  while  still  regarded  as  a 
radical,  generalized  it  and  extended  it  to  all  countries. 


412  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

"In  this  matter  of  wovld-reformino;,  it  is  our  misfortune  to 
disngree  with  our  radical  brethren.  The  reforms  which  can  be 
introduced  into  anj^  one  country  are  predetermined  by  its  geo- 
g-raphical  position,  the  productions  of  its  soil,  and  the  genius  of 
its  people  and  of  its  existing  institutions.  Any  reform  which 
requires  the  introduction  or  the  destruction  of  a  fundamental 
element  is  precluded.  All  reforms  must  consist  in,  and  be  re- 
stricted to,  clearing  away  anomalies  and  developing  already  ad- 
mitted principles." — Vol.  iv.  p.  532. 

Here  is  the  conservative  doctrine  stated  as  broadly  and  as 
distinctly  as  we  state  it  now,  and  we  could  easily  show  that  we 
entertained  it  at  a  much  earlier  date.  Doubtless  there  are  many 
ihings  to  be  found  in  The  Boston  Quarterly  Review  not  easily 
reconcilable  with  this  doctrine ;  for  we  had  not,  at  the  time  of 
conducting  it,  reduced  all  our  ideas  to  a  systematic  and  harmo- 
nious whole.  Moreovei',  we  wrote  with  less  care  than  we  do 
now ;  for  we  wrote  more  for  the  purpose  of  exciting  thought 
than  of  establishing  conclusions.  But  the  discrepancies  to  be 
detected  are  in  general  more  apparent  than  real ;  for  we,  un- 
happily, adopted  the  practice  of  using  popular  terms  in  an  un- 
popular sense,  which  often  gave  us  the  appearance  of  advocat- 
ing doctrines  we  by  no  means  intended.  Thus,  we  adopted  the 
word  democracy^  but  defined  it  in  a  sense  of  our  own,  very  dif- 
ferent from  the  popular  sense.  We  did  the  same  with  many 
other  terms.  There  was  in  this  no  intention  to  deceive.  But 
we  had  a  theory, — for  in  those  times  we  were  addicted  to  theo- 
rizing,— that  the  jieople  used  terms  in  a  loose  and  vague  sense, 
and  that  the  business  of  the  writer  was  to  seize  and  define  it, — 
to  give  in  its  precision  what  the  people  really  mean  by  the  term, 
if  they  could  but  explain  their  meaning  to  themselves.  But  we 
found  by  experience  that  we  could  not  make  the  people  attend 
to  our  definitions,  and  that  they  would,  in  spite  of  them,  con- 
tinue to  use  the  popular  term  in  its  popular  sense,  and  that,  if 
we  wished  to  express  another  sense,  or  the  same  sense  some- 
what modified,  we  must  select  another  term.  The  mistake  we 
fell  into  is  fallen  into  by  many  who  are  not  so  fortunate  as  to 


LEGITIMACV    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  41.3 

detect  it.  Some  of  our  friends  have  tried  to  find  fault  with  our 
views  on  Hberty,  when  their  own  views  were  the  same  as  ours. 
They  use  the  word  liberty  in  relations  in  which  we  avoid  it ; 
but  they,  in  using  it,  fail  to  convey  their  real  meaning.  The 
popular  mind  understands  by  liberty  something  very  different 
from  what  they  do.  It  is  necessary  to  select  terms  with  a  view  of 
denying  what  we  do  not  mean,  as  well  as  of  expressing  what 
we  do  mean.  Many  of  the  inconsistencies  we  have  been  charged 
with  have  grown  out  of  our  former  neglect  of  this  rule,  and  not 
a  few  of  the  changes  we  are  supposed  to  have  undergone  are 
really  nothing  but  changes  in  our  terminology,  made  for  the 
purpose  of  getting  our  real  meaning  out  to  public  apprehension. 
But  this  by  the  way.  Versatile  as  we  may  have  been,  we  have 
always  had  certain  fixed  principles,  and  what  they  were  may  be 
known  by  noting  what  we  have  cast  off  in  our  advance  towards 
manhood,  and  what  we  have  retained  and  still  retain.  The  con- 
servative principle  is  evidently  one  of  these,  and  as  we  undenia- 
bly held  it  when  nobody  dreamed  of  charging  us  with  hostility 
to  liberty,  we  cannot  see  why  our  holding  it  now  should  be  con- 
strued into  proof  that  we  are  on  the  side  of  despotism. 

But  let  us  look  at  the  doctrine  itself.  People  hold  it  objec- 
tionable, because  they  suppose  it  commands  us  to  preserve  old 
abuses  and  forbids  us  to  labor  for  the  progress  of  civihzation. 
But  in  this  they  assume  two  things: — 1.  That  the  legitimate 
constitution  of  a  state  is,  or  may  be,  an  abuse  ;  and,  2.  That  the 
progress  of  civilization  is  denied,  if  the  right  to  subvert  the  con- 
stitution is  denied. 

The  first  involves  a  contradiction  in  terms.  Nothing  legal  or 
legitimate  is  or  can  be,  an  abuse ;  An  abuse  is  a  misuse  of  that 
which  is  legal.  The  abuse  is  always  contrary  to  the  constitu- 
tion, or  at  least  some  departure  from  it ;  and  consequently  con- 
servatism, or  the  preservation  of  the  constitution,  instead  of  re- 
quiring us  to  conserve  the  abuse,  imperatively  commands  us  to 
redress  it  .  because,  if  not  redressed,  it  may  in  time  undermine 
and  destroy  the  constitution  itself. 

The  second  is  equally  unfounded.     The  destruction  of  the 


414  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

constitution  is  the  destruction  of  the  state  itself,  its  resohition 
into  anarchy  or  despotism,  either  of  which  is  fatal  to  civilization. 
Wliat  should  we  think  of  the  })hysician  who  should  undertake 
to  restore  a  man  to  health,  or  to  increase  his  soundness  and 
vigor,  by  destroying  his  constitution  ?  What  we  should  think 
of  him  is  precisely  what  we  ought  to  think  of  the  statesman 
wlio  seeks  to  advance  civilization  by  subverting  the  constitution 
of  the  state.  The  progress  of  civilization  is  inconceivable  with- 
out the  progress  of  the  state,  and  the  progress  of  the  state  is  in- 
conceivable without  the  existence  of  the  state.  How,  then,  can 
the  subversion,  that  is,  the  destruction,  of  the  state  tend  to  ad- 
vance civilization  ?  If  you  will  listen  either  to  common  sense  or 
to  the  lessons  of  experience,  you  will  grant  that  revolutions  tend 
only  to  throw  men  into  barbarism  and  savagism.  The  passions 
they  call  forth  are  the  lowest,  fiercest,  and  most  brutal  of  our 
nature,  and  your  patriot  so  called,  he  who  seeks  to  advance  his 
country  by  destroying  its  constitution,  is  usually  a  tiger  for  bis 
ferocity. 

But  it  is  said  that  the  existing  constitution  is  destroyed  only 
in  order  to  make  way  for^  new  and  better  organization  of  the 
state.  When  you  have  shown  us  an  instance,  in  the  whole  his- 
tory of  the  world,  in  which  the  destruction  of  an  existing  consti- 
tution of  a  state  has  been  followed  by  the  introduction  and 
adoption  of  a  new  and  better  one, — better  for  the  particular  na- 
tion, we  mean, — we  will  give  up  the  point,  acknowledge  that  we 
have  been  in  this  whole  matter  consummate  fools,  and  become 
as  mad  revolutionists  as  the  best  of  you.  But  such  an  instance 
cannot  be  found.  How  often  must  we  tell  you  that  a  constitu- 
tion cannot  be  made  as  one  makes  a  wheel-barrow  or  a  steam- 
engine, — that  of  the  constitution  we  must  say,  as  we  say  of  the 
poet,  "Nascitur,  non  fit?"  It  is  generated,  not  constructed, 
and  no  human  wisdom  can  give  to  a  state  its  constitution.  The 
experiment  has  often  been  tried,  and  has  just  as  often  failed. 
Shaftesbury  and  Locke  tried  it  for  the  Carolinas.  They  failed. 
France  tried  it  in  her  old  revolution ;  she  is  trying  it  again. 
Her  former  experiment  resulted  in  anarchy,  military  despotism, 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  415 

and  the  restoration  ;  her  present  experiment  in  four  short  months 
hiis  reached  military  despotism.  England  has  tried  it,  and  sent 
out  from  her  mills  at  home,  along  with  her  other  manufactures, 
a  constitution  cut  and  dried  for  each  of  her  colonies,  and  in  what 
instance  has  the  constitution  not  proved  a  curse  to  the  colony  for 
which  it  was  made  and  on  which  it  has  been  imposed  ?  Who 
are  these  men  who  now  come  forw^ard  and  ask  us  to  credit  them 
in  spite  of  philosoph}-,  of  common  sense,  uniform  experience, 
and  experiment  ?  Surely  they  must  be  prodigies  of  modesty,  or 
else  count  largely  on  our  simplicity  and  credulity. 

But  w^e  are  referred  to  our  own  country,  to  the  American 
Revolution.  Be  it  so.  In  reply,  we  might  refer  to  the  Spanish 
American  revolutions,  as  a  cas^  much  more  in  point.  But^our 
own  country  is  the  case  on  which  the  modern  revolutionists 
chiefly  rely  for  their  justification.  We  do  not  contest  the  right 
of  the  Anglo-American  colonies  to  separate  from  the  mother 
country ;  we  are  not  the  men  to  condemn  the  Congress  of  1776  ; 
and  we  cheerfully  concede  the  prosperity  which  has  followed  the 
separation.  But  what  is  called  the  American  Revolution  was 
no  revolution  in  the  sense  in  whick  we  deny  tlio  right  of  revo- 
lution, and  in  it  there  was  no  subversion  of  the  state,  no  destruc- 
tion of  the  existing  constitution,  and  no  assertion  of  the  right  to 
destroy  it.  The  colonies  were  held  by  compact  to  the  crown  of 
Great  Britain.  The  tyranny  of  George  the  Third  broke  that 
compact,  and  absolved  the  colonies  from  their  allegiance.  Ab- 
solved from  their  allegiance  to  the  crown,  they  were,  ipso  facto, 
sovereign  states,  and  the  war  which  followed  was  simply  a  war 
in  defence  of  their  independence  as  such  states.  No  abuse  of 
terms  can  convert  such  a  war  into  a  revolutionary  war.  Then 
there  was  no  civil  revolution.  The  internal  state  of  the  colonies 
was  not  dissolved,  and  there  was  no  war  on  the  constitution  of 
the  American  states.  They  retained  substantially  the  very  polit- 
ical constitutions  with  which  they  commenced,  and  retain  them 
up  to  this  moment.  We  have  never  undergone  a  revolution  in 
any  sense  like  the  European  revolutions  which  have  followed 
since  the  war  of  our  independence.     Slight  alterations  have  from 


416  LEGITIMACl    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

time  to  time  been,  wisely  or  unwisely,  effected  in  the  State  con- 
stitutions, but  none  which  have  struck  at  essential  principles. 

Nor  was  the  formation  of  our  Federal  Constitution  any  thing 
like  what  the  French  National  Assembly  are  attempting.  It 
was  similar  in  its  character  to  what  the  German  Diet  at  Frank- 
fort have  just  done,  or  are  still  engaged  in  doing.  It  was  not 
making  and  giving  a  constitution  to  a  people  who  had  just  over- 
thrown an  old  government,  destroyed  the  old  constitution,  and 
resolved  the  state  into  its  original  elements,  but  was  the  act  of 
free,  sovereign  states,  already  constituted,  and  exercising  all  the 
faculties  of  sovereign  states.  Here  are  vast  differences,  which 
are  too  often  overlooked,  and  which  should  prevent  our  conduct 
in  throwing  off  the  crown  of  Great  Britain  and  forming  the 
Federal  Union  fi*om  being  regarded  as  a  precedent  for  those  who 
would  destroy  an  existing  constitution  for  the  purpose  of  reor- 
ganizing the  state.  We  never  did  any  thing  of  the  sort,  and 
from  the  fact  that  the  result  of  what  we  did  do  has  been  great 
national  prosperity  it  cannot  be  inferred  that  such  will  be  the 
result  of  revolutions  in  the  European  states.  Revolutionists  both 
at  home  and  abroad,  especially  abroad,  do  not  sufficiently  con- 
sider the  wide  difference  between  colonies  already  existing  as 
bodies  politic,  exercising  nearly  all  the  functions  of  government, 
separating  themselves  politically,  under  the  authority  of  their 
local  governments,  from  the  mother  country,  and  setting  up  for 
themselves,  and  the  insurrection  of  the  mob  against  the  existing 
constitution,  destroying  it,  and  attempting  to  replace  it  by  one 
of  their  own  making.  We  were  children  come  to  our  majority, 
leaving  our  father's  house  to  become  heads  of  establishments  of 
our  own  ;  the  revolutionists  are  parricides,  who  knock  their  aged 
parent  in  the  head  or  cut  his  throat  in  order  to  possess  them- 
selves of  the  homestead. 

But  however  this  may  bo,  it  is  clear  that  the  doctiine  we  put 
forth  is  not  favorable  to  despotism  ;  for  despotism  is  as  destruc- 
tive of  the  legitimate  constitution  as  revolutionism  in  fiivor  of 
what  is  called  Liberalism.  Radicalism  and  despotism  are  only 
two  phases  of  one  and  the  same  thing.     Despotism  is  radicalism 


LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  41 7 

in  place  ;  radicalism  is  despotism  out  of  place.  Both  are  un- 
constitutional, and  to  preserve  the  constitution  requires  us  to 
oppose  the  one  as  much  as  the  other.  Liberty  demands  the 
supremacy  of  the  law,  and  law  is  will  regulated  by  reason,  res- 
trained by  justice ;  and  to  preserve  law  in  this  sense,  we  must 
resist  every  attempt,  come  it  from  what  quarter  it  may,  to  sub- 
stitute for  it  the  government  of  arbitrary  will. 

Nobody  denies  the  right  to  correct  abuses.  The  doctrine  we 
set  forth  not  only  concedes  our  right  to  correct  abuses,  but  makes 
it,  as  we  have  seen,  our  duty  to  correct  them.  All  that  it  for- 
bids is  our  light  to  correct  them  by  illegal,  and  therefore  unjus- 
tifiable means.  We  must  obey  the  law  in  correcting  the  abuses 
of  the  law,  the  constitution  in  repelling  its  enemies.  This  re- 
stiiction  is  just,  and  good  ends  are  never  attainable  by  unjust 
means.  Needs  it  be  said  again  and  again,  that  iniquity  can 
never  lead  to  justice,  tyranny  to  liberty  ?  But  observing  this 
restriction,  you  may  go  as  far  as  you  please.  The  doctnne  we 
contend  for  does  not,  indeed,  allow  you  to  change  a  legal  mon- 
archy into  a  democracy,  nor  a  democracy,  where  it  is  the  legal 
order,  as  with  us,  into  a  monarchy ;  but  it  does  allow  you  to 
change  the  individuals  intrusted  with  the  administration  of  the 
government.  Kings,  as  long  as  they  reign  justly,  reign  by  di- 
vine right ;  and  in  this  sense,  and  in  no  other,  we  accept  the 
doctrine  of  the  divine  right  of  king's  ;  but  when  they  cease  to 
reign  justly,  become  tyrannical  and  oppressive,  they  forfeit  their 
rights,  and  the  authority  reverts  to  the  nation,  to  be  exercised, 
however,  in  accordance  with  its  fundamental  constitution.  The 
nation  may  depose  the  tyrant,  even  dispossess,  for  sufficient  rea- 
sons, the  reigning  femil}",  and  call  a  new  dynasty  to  the  throne ; 
for  no  nation  can  be  rightfully  the  property  of  a  prince,  or  of  a 
family,  or  bound  to  submit  to  eternal  slavery.  Thus  far  we  go ; 
for  we  hold  with  the  great  Catholic  authorities,  that  the  king  is 
not  in  reigning,  but  in  reigning  justly. 

But  we  have  said  enough  to  vindicate  our  doctrine  from  the 
charge  of  being  hostile  to  liberty  and  favorable  to  despotism. 
We  yield  to  no  man  in  our  love  of  liberty,  but  we  have  always 


418  LEGITIMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM. 

felt  that  just  ends  are  more  easily  gained  by  just  than  by  nnjust 
means,  and  that  the  truth  is  much  more  effectually  defended  by 
arguments  drawn  from  sound  than  from  unsound  principles.     It 
is  not  that  we  are  indifferent  to  liberty,  but  that  we  reject  the 
grounds  on  which  modern  politicians  defend  it,  and  disapprove 
of  the  means  by  which  they  seek  to  secure  it.     We  have  shown 
that  those  grounds  are  untenable,  and  that  those  means  are  fitted 
only  to  defeat  the  end  for  which  they  are  adopted.     He  who 
wants  more  than  justice  will  give  him  wants  what  he  cannot 
have  without  injustice  to  others.     Our  doctrine  will  satisfy  no 
such  man,   and  we  should  be  satisfied  with  no  doctrine  that 
would.     He  who  wishes  for  liberty  without  obedience  to  law 
wishes  for  what  never  has  been  and  never  can  be.     An  authori- 
ty which  does  not  restrain,  which  is  only  an  instrument  to  be 
used  when  it  serves  our  purpose,  and  to  be  cast  off  the  moment 
it  can  no  longer  serve  it,  is  no  legitimate  authority,  is  not  a  gov- 
ernment at  all.     If  we  have  government,  it  must  govern,  and  we 
must  obey  it,  even  when  to  obey  it  may  be  a  restraint  on  our 
private  feelings  and  passions,  for  it  is  only  at  this  price  that  we 
can  purchase  immunity  from  the  private  feelings  and  passions 
of  others.     Nothing  is,  then,  in  reality  more  unwise  than  to 
cherish  an  impatience  of  restraint  and  a  spirit  of  insubordination. 
The  sooner  we  learn  the  difficult  lesson  of  obedience,  the  better 
will  it  be  for  us.     AYe  cannot,  if  w^e  would,  have  every  thing  our 
own  way  ;  and  perhaps  it  would  not  be  to  our  advantage,  if  we 
could.     Life  has,  and  as  long  as  the  world  stands  will  have,  its 
trials,  and,  however  impatient  we  may  be,  there  is  and  will  be 
much  which  we  can  conquer  only  by  learning  to  bear  it.     It  is 
easy  to  stir  up  a  revolution,  to  subvert  a  throne  or  a  dynasty ; 
but  to  reestablish  order,  to  readjust  the  relations  of  man  with 
man,  of  prince  with  subject  and  subject  with  prince,  so  as  to  re- 
move all  evils  and  satisfy  every  wish,— this  is  labor,  this  is  work, 
which  no  mortal  man  has  ever  yet  been  equal  to.     A  man 
could  lose  paradise,  bring  sin,  death,  and  all  our  woe  into  the 
world ;  only  a  God  could  repair  the  damage,  and  restore  us  to 
the  heaven  we  had  forfeited. 


LEGITIxMACY    AND    REVOLUTIONISM.  419 

Our  doctrine,  just  at  this  moment,  may  be  unpopular,  and 
we  know  it  will  put  no  money  into  our  pocket,  and  bring  us  no 
applause  ;  but  this  is  not  our  fault,  nor  a  reason  why  we  should 
withhold  it.  Having  never  yet  pandered  to  popular  prejudices, 
or  sought  to  derive  profit  from  popular  passions  and  fallacies, 
we  shall  not  attempt  to  do  it  now.  We  love  our  country,  per- 
haps, as  much  as  some  others  who  make  much  more  parade  of 
their  patriotism ;  and  we  love  liberty,  it  may  be,  as  well,  and 
are  likel}^  to  serve  it  as  efifectually,  as  our  young  revolutionists 
in  whom  reason  "sleeps  and  declamation  roars."  We  have, 
indeed,  a  tolerable  pair  of  lungs,  and  if  not  a  musical,  at  least 
a  strong  voice ;  we  know  and  could  use  all  the  commonplaces 
of  our  young  patriots,  and  reformers, — nay,  we  think  we  could, 
if  we  were  to  try,  beat  them  at  their  own  trade,  grave  and  staid 
as  we  have  become  ;  but  we  have  no  disposition  to  enter  the 
lists  with  them.  Yv^e  have  never  seen  any  good  come  from  the 
declamatory  speeches  and  fiery  patriotism  of  boys  just  escaped 
the  ferula  of  the  pedagogue,  and  who  can  give  utterance  to 
nothing  but  puerile  rant  about  liberty  and  patriotism.  We 
have  never  seen  good  come  to  a  country  whose  counsellors  were 
young  men  with  downy  chins,  and  we  set  it  down  as  a  rule, 
that  the  country  in  which  they  can  take  the  lead,  whatever  else 
it  is  fitted  for,  is  not  fitted  for  the  liberty  which  comes  through 
popular  institutions. 

We  can  weep  as  well  as  our  junioi-s  over  a  nation  robbed  of 
its  rights,  on  whose  palpitating  heart  is  planted  the  iron  heel  of 
the  conqueror,  and  have  the  will,  if  not  the  power,  to  strike,  if 
we  can  but  see  a  vulnerable  spot,  or  a  chance  that  the  blow  will 
tell  upon  the  tyrant.  But,  as  a  general  thing,  we  have  a  great 
distaste  for  the  valor  that  evaporates  in  words,  though  they  be 
great  and  high-sounding  words,  w^ell  chosen,  skilfully  arranged, 
and  admirably  pronounced  ;  and  an  equal  distaste  even  for 
deeds  which  recoil  upon  the  actor,  and  aggravate  his  sufferings, 
already  too  afflicting  to  behold.  We  beheve  it  wise  to  bide 
one's  time,  and  to  take  council  of  prudence.  In  most  cases, 
the  sufferings  of  a  people  spring  from  moral  causes  beyond  the 


420  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

reach  of  civil  government,  and  they  are  rarely  the  best  patriots 
vi^ho  paint  them  in  the  most  vivid  colors,  and  rouse  up  popular 
indignation  against  the  civil  authorities.  Much  more  etfectual 
service  could  be  rendered  in  a  more  quiet  and  peaceful  way, 
by  each  one  seeking,  in  his  own  immediate  sphere,  to  remove 
the  moral  causes  of  the  evils  endured.  St.  Vincent  of  Paul 
was  a  far  wiser  and  more  successful  patriot  than  the  greatest 
of  your  popular  orators,  declaimers,  and  songsters.  He,  hum- 
ble-minded priest,  had  no  ambition  to  shine,  no  splendid  scheme 
of  world  or  state  reform.  He  thought  only  of  saving  his  own 
soul,  by  doing  the  work  that  lay  next  him  ;  and  he  became  the 
benefactor  of  his  age  and  his  country,  and  in  his  noble  institu- 
tions of  charity  he  still  lives,  and  each  year  extends  his  in- 
fluence and  adds  to  the  millions  who  are  recipients  of  his  boun- 
ty. O  ye  who  would  serve  your  country,  relieve  the  suffering, 
solace  the  afflicted,  and  right  the  wronged,  go  imitate  St.  Vin- 
cent of  Paul,  and  Heaven  will  own  you  and  posterity  revere 
you. 


NATIVE   AMERICANISM.* 

JANUARY,    1845. 


"VVe  have  read  this  pamphlet  with  pleasure  and  instruction. 
It  is  written  in  good  temper,  and  with  a  good  share  of  ability. 
It  triumphantly  refutes  the  oft  repeated  slander,  that  the  Roman 
Catholic  Church  is  incompatible  with  republican  institutions  and 
popular  freedom ;  and,  though  it  contains  expressions,  and,  if  by 
a  Cathohc,  concessions,  which  we  do  not  approve  or  believe  war- 
ranted, we  commend  it  to  the  American  Protestant  Society,  and 
especially  to  the  so-called  Native  American  party.  Neither  can 
hardly  fail  to  profit  by  its  careful  and  diligent  perusal. 

*  Catholicism  compatible  with  Republican  Government,  and  in  full 
Accordance  with  Popular  Institutions.  By  Fenelon  New  York  : 
Edward  Dunnigan.     1844.     Svo.     pp.  48, 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  421 

We  have  introduced  this  pamphlet  simply  as  the  text  of  some 
few  remarks  the  subject  of  Native  Americanism.  We  are 
ourselves  native-born,  and  we  hope  not  deficient  in  true  love  of 
country.  Though  not  blind  to  the  faults  of  our  countrymen, 
and  endeavoring  on  all  occasions  to  place  the  love  of  God  before 
the  love  of  country,  we  believe  we  possess  some  share  of  genuine 
patriotic  feehng.  We  know  we  have  loved  American  institu- 
tions ;  and  we  are  ready  to  vindicate  them,  with  what  little  abil- 
ity we  may  have,  on  any  occasion,  and  against  any  and  every 
sort  of  enemies.  But  we  confess  that  we  have  and  have  had, 
from  the  first,  no  sympathy,  with  what  is  called  Native  Ameri- 
canism. We  have  seen  no  necessity  for  a  movement  against 
foreignei-s  who  choose  to  make  this  land  then-  home ;  and  we 
have  felt  that  such  a  movement,  while  it  could  lead  to  no  good, 
might  lead  to  results  truly  deplorable. 

We  have  been  accustomed  to  trace  the  hand  of  a  merciful 
Providence  in  reserving  this  New  World  to  so  late  a  day  for 
Christian  civilization ;  we  have  been  in  the  habit  of  believing 
that  it  was  not  ^\dthout  a  providential  design,  that  here  was  re- 
served an  open  field  in  which  that  civilization,  disengaging  itself 
from  the  vices  and  corruptions  of  the  Old  World,  might  display 
itself  in  all  its  purity,  strength,  and  glory.  We  have  regarded 
it  as  a  chosen  land,  not  for  one  race,  or  one  people,  but  for  the 
wronged  and  downtrodden  of  all  nations,  tongues,  and  kindreds, 
where  they  might  come  as  to  a  holy  asylum  of  peace  and  char- 
ity. It  has  been  a  cause  of  gratulation,  of  ardent  thankfulness 
to  Almighty  God,  that  here  was  founded,  as  it  were,  a  city  of 
refuge,  to  which  men  might  flee  from  oppression,  be  free  from 
the  trammels  of  tyranny,  regain  their  rights  as  men,  and  dwell 
in  security.-  Here  all  partition  walls  which  make  enemies  of 
different  races  and  nations  were  to  be  broken  down ;  all  senseless 
and  mischievous  distinctions  of  rank  and  caste  were  to  be  dis- 
carded ;  and  every  man,  no  matter  where  born,  in  what  language 
trained,  was  to  be  regarded  as  man, — as  nothing  more,  as  noth- 
ing less.  Here  we  were  to  found,  not  a  repubhc  of  Englishmen, 
of  Frenchmen,  of  Dutchmen,  of  Irishmen,  but  of  men ;  and  to 


422  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

make  the  word  American  mean,  not  a  man  born  on  this  soil  or 
on  that,  but  a  free  and  accepted  member  of  the  grand  repubhc 
of  men.  Such  is  what  has  been  boasted  as  the  principle  and 
the  destiny  of  this  New  World ;  and  with  this,  we  need  not 
say,  Native  Americanism  is  directly  at  war. 

The  great  principle  of  true  Americanism,  if  we  may  use  the 
word,  is,  that  merit  makes  the  man.  It  discards  all  distinctions 
which  are  purely  accidental,  and  recognizes  only  such  as  are  per- 
sonal. It  places  every  man  on  his  own  two  feet,  and  says  to 
him.  Be  a  man,  and  you  shall  be  esteemed  according  to  your 
worth  as  a  man ;  you  shall  be  commended  only  for  your  per- 
sonal merits ;  you  shall  be  made  to  suffer  only  for  your  personal 
demerits.  To  each  one  according  to  his  capacity,  to  each  capa- 
city according  to  its  works.  This  is  Americanism.  It  is  this 
which  has  been  our  boast,  which  has  constituted  our  country's 
true  glory.  It  is  this  which  we  have  inherited  from  our  ftithers ; 
it  is  this  which  we  hold  as  a  sacred  trust,  and  must  preserve  in 
all  its  purity,  strength,  and  activity,  if  we  would  not  prove 
"degenerate  sons  of  noble  sires;"  and  it  is  this,  which  Native 
Americanism,  so  called,  opposes, — and  because  it  opposes  this, 
no  true  American  can  support  it. 

There  is  something  grateful  to  all  our  better  feelings  in  the 
thought,  that  here  is  a  home  to  which  the  oppressed  can  come, 
and  find  the  rights,  the  respect,  and  the  well-being  denied  them 
in  the  land  of  their  birth.  The  emigrant's  condition  is  not  a 
little  improved  by  touching  upon  our  shores ;  and  the  condition 
of  his  brother-laborers,  whom  he  leaves  behind,  is  also  not  a  lit- 
tle ameliorated,  and  the  general  sum  of  well-being  is  greatly  aug- 
mented. On  the  simple  score  of  philanthropy,  then,  who  would 
not  struggle  to  keep  our  country  open  to  the  emigrant,  and  be 
prepared  to  welcome  him  as  a  brother,  and  to  rejoice  that 
another  is  added  to  the  family  of  freemen  ? 

But  even  as  a  question  of  our  own  interest  as  a  people,  we 
should  welcome  the  foreigner.  If  we  would  sit  down  and  reckon 
up  what  we  lose  and  what  we  gain  by  foreigners  coming  to  set- 
tle among  us,  we  should  find  the  gain  greatly  overbalances  the 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  423 

loss.  Naturalized  citizens  constitute  no  inconsiderable  portion 
of  our  population,  and  by  no  means  the  least  important  portion. 
Without  these,  what  would  have  been  our  condition  now? 
Whose  labor  has  cleared  away  many  of  our  Western  forests, 
dug  our  canals  and  railroads  ?  and  by  whose  labor  and  practical 
skill  have  we  introduced  our  manufactures,  and  brought  thera  to 
their  present  high  state  of  perfection  ?  In  all  the  branches  of 
manufactures,  in  nearly  all  branches  of  mechanical  industry,  the 
head  workmen,  if  we  have  been  rightly  informed,  are  foreigners. 
And  why  foreigners,  rather  than  native-born  ?  Surely,  not  be- 
cause there  is  any  partiality  for  foreigners  over  native  Americans, 
but  because  they  are  more  thorough  mastei-s  of  their  business. 
Then,  who  man  our  navy,  of  which  we  are  so  justly  proud  ?  and 
who  constitute,  in  time  of  war,  the  rank  and  file  of  our  army  ? 
Not  all  foreigners,  truly ;  but  not  a  few  who  were  not  born  on 
American  soil.  No  small  portion  of  our  hardy  seamen  are  of 
alien  birth ;  but  they  are  none  the  less  true  to  our  flag  on  that 
account,  nor  any  the  less  freely  do  they  spill  their  blood  for  our 
national  defence  or  national  glory.  We  do  not  agree  with  the 
assertion  said  to  have  been  made  by  a  foreigner  residing  amongst 
us,  that  native  Americans  are  cowards ,  and  if  we  did,  we  have 
still  too  much  of  the  old  Adam,  and  of  the  narrow  feeling  of 
former  times,  to  suffer  him,  without  rebuke,  to  tell  us  so.  Amer- 
icans are  not  deficient  in  courage,  and  will,  when  necessary,  face 
the  enemy  as  boldly  as  any  other  people  on  the  globe.  Never- 
theless, our  ranks  are  not  dishonored  by  foreigners,  and  no  na- 
tive-born citizens  have  ever  done  our  country's  flag  more  Fonor 
or  fought  more  valiantly  in  its  defence,  than  the  brave  and  warm- 
hearted Irish ;  and  none  would  do  us  more  eflBcient  service  again, 
were  we  so  unhappy  as  to  be  involved  in  a  war.  In  the  Rcto- 
lution,  we  found  men  not  born  in  America  could  fight  manfully 
for  us,  and  then  they  were  not  considered  as  in  the  way  of  the 
native-born.  It  was  no  loss  to  us  to  reckon  in  our  army  a 
Montgomery,  a  Gates,  a  De  Kalb,  a  Steuben,  a  Pulaski,  a  La- 
fayette. No ;  man  is  man,  wherever  born ;  and  every  freeman 
is  our  brother,  and  we  should  clasp  him  to  our  bosom. 


424  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

As  a  party  movement,  the  Native  American  paiiy  is  con- 
temptible. As  a  movement  of  native  American  citizens  against 
foreigners  who  come  amongst  us  to  claim  the  rights  and  to  per- 
form the  duties  of  citizens,  it  is  founded  on  low  and  ungener- 
ous prejudices, — prejudices  of  birth,  which  we,  as  a  people,  pro- 
fess to  discard.  We,  as  a  people,  recognize  no  nobility  founded 
on  birth ;  for  our  principle  is,  that  all  who  are  born  at  all  are 
well-born.  But  what  is  the  effort  to  confine  the  political  func- 
tions incident  to  citizenship  to  native-born  Americans,  but  the 
attempt  to  found  an  aristocracy  of  birth,  even  a  political  aristoc- 
racy, making  the  accident  of  birth  the  condition  of  political 
rights  ?  Is  this  Americanism  ?  The  American  who  pretends  it 
is  false  to  his  American  creed,  and  has  no  American  heart. 

We,  of  course,  do  not  oppose  Native  Americanism  on  the 
untenable  ground,  that  every  man  has  a  natural  right  to  be  a 
(vVf  citizen,  and  to  take  part  in  the  administration  of  the  goveru- 
^ I  ment.  The  right  of  suffrage  is  a  municipal  right,  not  a  natural 
"^  I  right.  But  we,  as  a  people,  have  adopted,  with  slight  restric- 
*"  tions,  the  principle  of  universal  suffrage.     We,  as  a  people,  hold 

that  the  government  is  safest  where  all  the  people  have  a  voice 
in  saying  what  it  shall  be  and  who  shall  be  its  administrators. 
We  adopt  universal  suffrage,  not  indeed  as  a  right,  but  as  a 
dictate  of  prudence.  We  hold  that  we  select  better  men  to 
rule  us,  and  enact  wiser  and  more  equitable  laws,  by  admitting 
the  great  body  of  the  people  to  a  participation  of  political  sov- 
ereignty, than  we  should  by  confining  the  sovereignty  to  one 
man  or  to  a  few  men.  We  hold  that  the  people  are  best  gov- 
erned, when  they  constitute  and  manage  the  government  fliem- 
selves.  This  is  the  political  creed  of  the  country;  and  he  is 
false  to  his  country,  who  would  abolish  it,  or  defeat  its  practical 
application.  Foreigners,  who  come  here,  have,  then,  in  view  of 
the  acknowledged  principles  of  the  country,  a  right  to  be  ad- 
mitted to  citizenship,  to  the  rank  and  dignity  of  freemen ;  and 
could  rightly  complain  of  injustice,  if  not  so  admitted. 

But  we  are  told  that  the  Native  American  party  does  not 
propose  to  exclude  foreigners  from  the  country,  nor  froni  citi- 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  425 

zenship.     It  only  wishes   to  prevent  them  from  coming  here 
and  exercising  the  rights  of  citizens  before  being  properly  in- 
structed in  the  duties  of  citizens.     This  plea  is  specious,  but  not 
sohd.     It  is  the  pubhc  ostensible  plea ;  but  not  the  private,  real 
one.     The  real  design  is,  to  exclude  foreigners,  to  prevent  them 
from  coming  here,  by  denying  them  the  right  to  become  citi- 
zens.    We  have  never  conversed  with  an  advocate  of  the  party 
who  did  not  avow  this.     But  take  the  plea  as  publicly  offered. 
It  is  contended  that  foreigners,  brought  up  under  monarchical 
or  aristocratical  governments,  cannot  be  expected,  on  arriving 
on  our  shores,  to  understand  the  nature  of  our  peculiar  form  of 
government,  and  that  it  is  necessary  for  them  to  serve  a  long 
novitiate  before  they  can  be  prepared  to  enter  upon  the  duties 
of  freemen.     The  necessity  of  intelligence,  of  understanding  well 
our  peculiar  institutions,  on  the  part  of  every  man  who  is  to  ex- 
ercise the  i-ights  and  to  discharge  the  duties  of  a  citizen,  we 
certainly  shall  not  dispute,  whether  the  man  was  born  at  home 
or  abroad.     But  the  ignorance  of  the  foreigners  who  come  here 
is  greatly  exaggerated.     Brought  up  under  monarchical  or  aris- 
tocratical governments,  one  would  naturally  expect  them  to  be 
avei-se  to  our  democracy,  and  in  favor  of  institutions  similar  to 
those  wdth  which  they  had  been  accustomed.     But  no  com- 
plaint of  this  kind  is  ever  made  against  them.     Foreigners  who 
come  here  and  condemn  our  institutions,  show  contempt  for 
them,  and  wish  to  exchange  them  for  institutions  similar  to 
those  they  have  left  behind,  ar,e  in  general  cordially  welcomed, 
and  treated  with  great  consideration.     The  complaint  is  the  re- 
verse of  this,  their  offence  is  in  being  too  democratic,  and  in 
wishing  the  government  to  be  administered  on  stirctly  demo- 
cratic principles.     It  is  not  their  ignorance  of  the  real  nature  of 
democracy,  but  their  intelligence  of  it,  that  constitutes  their  dis- 
qualification. 

But  pass  over  this.  The  naturalization  laws,  as  they  now  are, 
require  a  foreigner  to  reside  in  the  country  five  years  before  he 
can  become  a  citizen,  or  be  legally  naturalized.  This  is,  in  gen- 
eral, five  years  after  the  man  has  become  of  full  age.     Now,  it  is 


428  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

fair  to  presume  that  an  emigrant  to  tins  country,  intGLd. -ig  U) 
come  here  and  to  make  this  his  home,  has  before  coming  made 
some  inquiries  respecting  the  country,  the  character  of  its  peo- 
ple, its  government,  and  laws ;  and  he  may  be  judged  to  know 
as  much  of  them  as  in  general  one  of  our  own  boys  at  the  age 
of  sixteen.  In  most  cases  he  knows  much  more,  but  assume 
that  he  knows  as  much.  Then  he  and  the  native-born  are 
placed  on  the  same  footing.  Each  must  wait  five  years  before 
entering  upon  the  discharge  of  his  duties  as  a  citizen ;  and  who 
will  pretend  to  say  that  a  man  from  the  age  of  twenty-one  to 
twenty-six  cannot  learn  as  much  of  what  those  duties  are,  as  the 
boy  from  sixteen  to  twenty-one  ?  The  law,  as  it  now  stands, 
exacts  in  reality  as  long  a  novitiate  of  the  foreign-born  as  of  the 
native-born  ;  and  even  on  the  ground  of  time  to  be  instructed  in 
one's  duties,  no  more  needs  to  be  altered  in  the  case  of  the  one 
than  of  the  other. 

But,  politically  speaking,  this  objection  is  not  the  real  one. 
The  political  leaders,  of  the  Native  American  party,  are  opposed 
to  naturahzed  citizens  solely  on  the  ground  that  these  citizens  do 
not  uniformly  vote  on  their  side.  We  do  not  discover  that  our 
politicians  of  either  party  object  to  the  votes  of  naturalized  citi- 
zens when  given  for  them,  nor  to  naturalizing  them,  if  they  feel 
sure  of  their  suffrages.  Why  not  say  so,  then,  and  let  the  hon- 
est truth  come  out  ?  Surely,  honest  men,  high-minded  men, 
the  true  nobility  of  the  earth,  as  all  our  political  leaders  are,  can 
have  no  objections  to  avowing  their  real  intentions,  and  the 
real  motives  from  which  they  act.  Such  men  will  never  show 
false  colors  ! 

But  the  objection  to  foreigners  is  not  exclusively  political,  nor 
chiefly  political.  Below  this  is  another  objection,  which  operates 
chiefly  amongst  the  laboring  classes.  The  mass  of  the  people, 
especially  of  those  who  live  on  from  father  to  son  in  the  same  po- 
sition and  pursuit,  retain  almost  forever  their  primitive  prejudices. 
These  in  this  country  are  of  English  descent, — for  we  are  all  of 
foreign  extraction  ;  and  they  have  inherited  from  their  ancestors, 
and  still  retain,  two  strong  prejudices, — contempt  of  the  Irish 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  42^ 

and  hatred  of  the  French.  There  is  no  use  in  disguising  the 
fact.  The  assistance  the  French  rendered  us  in  the  Revohition 
has  molHfied  our  feehngs  somewhat  towards  them,  but  we  still 
bear  them  no  real  good-will.  But  the  national  Enghsh  con- 
tempt for  the  Irish  has  been  reinforced  in  America.  The  Yan- 
kee hod-carrier,  or  Yankee  wood-sawyer,  looks  dow^n  with  ineffa- 
ble contempt  upon  his  brother  Irish  hod-carrier  or  Irish  wood- 
sawyer.  In  his  estimation,  "  Paddy "  hardly  belongs  to  the 
human  family.  Add  to  this  that  the  influx  of  foreign  laborers, 
chiefly  Irish,  increases  the  supply  of  labor,  and  therefore  appar- 
ently lessens  the  demand,  and  consequently  the  wages  of  labor, 
and  you  have  the  elements  of  a  wide,  deep,  and  inveterate  hos- 
tility on  the  part  of  your  Yankee  laborer  against  your  Irish  la- 
borer, wdiich  manifests  itself  naturally  in  your  Native  American 
party.  But  this  contempt  of  the  Irish,  which  we  have  inherited 
from  our  English  ancestors,  is  wrong  and  ungenerous.  The 
Irish  do  not  deserve  it,  and  it  does  not  become  us  to  feel  it.  It 
is  a  prejudice  disgraceful  only  to  those  who  are  governed  by  it, 
and  no  words  of  condemnation  are  sufficiently  severe  for  the 
political  aspirant  who  would  appeal  to  it.  Every  friend  to  his 
country,  every  right-minded  man,  must  frown  upon  it,  and  brand 
as  an  incendiary,  as  a  public  enemy,  the  demagogue,  whether  in 
a  caucus  speech  in  old  Faneuil  Hall  or  elsewhere,  whether  ad- 
mired by  the  whole  nation  for  his  transcendent  abilities  or  not, 
who  should  seek  to  deepen  it,  or  even  to  keep  it  alive. 

But,  after  all,  the  competition,  which  our  native  American 
laborers  so  much  dread,  is  far  less  than  they  imagine.  The  for- 
eign laborers  do  not,  in  general,  come  directly  into  competition 
with  them.  A  great  part  of  the  labor  they  perform  is  labor 
which  native  Americans  could  not  or  would  not  perform  them- 
selves. Then,  the  increased  demand  for  labor  in  other  branches 
of  industry,  caused  by  the  works  carried  on  mainly  by  the  labor 
of  foreigners,  fully  compensates,  perhaps  more  than  compensates, 
the  native  iVmerican  laborers  for  any  loss  they  may  sustain  in 
the  few  cases  of  competition  which  there  really  may  be.  View- 
ed in  all  its  bearings,  the  influx  of  foreign  laborers  has  very  little, 


428  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

if  any,  injurious  effect  on  our  own  native  laborers.  The  bn- 
mense  internal  improvements  completed  or  in  process  of  comple- 
tion would  never  have  been  attempted,  if  the  reliance  had  been 
solely  on  native  labor,  and,  consequently,  none  of  the  additional 
labor  employed  in  the  various  branches  of  industry,  which  these 
improvements  have  stimulated,  would  have  been  in  demand. 
The  laboring  class,  as  a  class,  has  really  gained  in  the  amount  of 
employment  by  the  increase  of  laborers,  and  of  course,  in  the 
price  of  labor.  Labor  begets  the  demand  for  labor.  Individu- 
als may  have  suflfered  somewhat,  in  some  particular  branches, 
but  upon  the  whole  the  laboring  class  has  been  benefited. 

But  the  real  objection  lies  deeper  yet.  The  Native  American 
party  is  not  a  party  against  admitting  foreigners  to  the  rights  of 
citizenship,  but  simply  against  admitting  a  certain  class  of  for- 
eigners. It  does  not  oppose  Protestant  Germans,  Protestant 
Englishmen,  Protestant  Scotchmen,  nor  even  Protestant  Irish- 
men. It  is  really  opposed  only  to  Catholic  foreigners.  The 
party  is  truly  an  anti-Catholic  party,  and  is  opposed  chiefly  to 
the  Irish,  because  a  majority  of  the  emigrants  to  this  country  are 
probably  from  Ireland,  and  the  greater  part  of  these  are  Catho- 
lics. If  they  were  Protestants,  if  they  could  mingle  with  the 
native  population  and  lose  themselves  in  our  Protestant  sects, 
very  little  opposition  would  be  manifested  to  their  immigration 
or  to  their  naturalization.  But  this  they  cannot  do.  They  arc 
Catholics.  They  adhere  to  the  faith  of  their  fathers,  for  which 
they  have  suffered  these  three  hundred  years  more  than  any 
other  people  on  earth.  Being  Catholics,  they  hold  religion  to 
be  man's  primary  concern,  and  the  public  worship  of  God  an 
imperative  duty.  They  accordingly  seek  to  settle  near  together, 
in  a  neighborhood,  where  the  Church  may  rise  in  their  midst, 
■within  reacli  of  the  altar  where  the  "  clean  sacrifice  "  is  offered 
up  daily  for  the  living  and  the  dead,  and  where  they  can  receive 
the  inestimable  services  of  the  minister  of  God.  Hence,  they 
seem,  because  in  this  respect  their  habits  differ  from  those  of  our 
Protestant  countrymen,  to  be  a  separate  people,  incapable  even 
in  their  political  and  social  duties  of  fraternizing,  so  to  speak, 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  429 

with  their  Protestant  fellow-citizens.     Here  is  the  first  and  im- 
mediate cause  of  the  opposition  they  experience. 

But  deeper  yet  Hes  the  old  traditionary  hatred  of  Cathohcity. 
The  majority  of  the  American  people  have  descended  from  an- 
cestors who  were  accustomed  to  pray  to  be  delivered  from  the 
flesh,  the  world,  the  devil,  and  the  Pope;  and  though  they 
have  in  a  great  degree  rejected  the  remains  of  faith  still  cherish- 
ed by  their  Protestant  ancestors,  they  retain  all  their  hatred  of 
the  Church.  If  they  believe  nothing  else,  they  believe  the  Pope 
is  Antichrist,  and  the  Catholic  Church  the  Scarlet  Lady  of  Bab- 
ylon. When  the  Catholic  Church  is  in  question,  all  the  infidels 
and  nothingarians  are  sure  to  sympathize  with  their  Protestant 
brethren.  Pilate  and  Herod  are  good  friends,  when  it  concerns 
crucifying  the  Redeemer  of  men.  This  is,  perhaps,  as  it  should 
be.  Hence,  the  great  mass  of  the  American  people,  faithful  to 
their  traditions,  are  inveterately  opposed  to  Catholicity,  and  it  is 
this  opposition  that  manifests  itself  in  Native  Americanism,  and 
which  renders  it  so  inexcusable  and  so  dangerous. 

We  presume  there  are  few  who  will  question  this  statement. 
The  "  Native  Americans  "  with  whom  we  have  conversed,  all,  to 
a  man,  avow  it,  and  the  late  disgraceful  riots  and  murder  and 
sacrilege  in  Philadelphia  prove  it.  There,  no  harm  was  done  to 
Protestant  foreigners.  Hostility  was  directed  solely  against 
Cathohcs.  They  were  Catholics,  who  were  shot  down  in  the 
streets, — Catholic  churches,  seminaries,  and  dwelhngs,  that  were 
rifled  and  burnt.  Even  the  most  active  members  of  the  Native 
Ameri.can  party,  if  we  may  be  pardoned  the  Hibernian  ism,  are 
in  many  cases  foreigners.  The  notorious  ex-priest  Hogan,  a 
foreigner  and  an  Irishman,  deposed  for  his  immoral  conduct,  is, 
if  we  are  rightly  informed,  a  most  zealous  Native^  and  has  been 
lecturing  in  this  city  and  vicinity  in  favor  of  Native  American- 
ism, and  we  have  heard  no  Nativist  object  to  having  men  like 
him  exercise  the  rights  of  an  American  citizen.  The  Orange- 
men, foreigners  as  they  are,  did  the  Natives  substantial  service 
in  Philadelphia,  as  it  has  been  said,  and  they  threaten  to  do  the 
sAme  here,  if  occasion  serve.     All  this  proves  that  the  opposi- 


430  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

tion  is  not  to  foreigners,  as  such,  but  simply  to  Catholics,  find 
especially  to  Irisli  Catholics. 

Now  aG,-ainst  this,  we  hardly  need  say,  we  protest  in  the  name 
of  the  Constitution,  and  the  good  faith  of  the  country.  The 
Constitution  of  this  country  does  not  merely  tolerate  different 
relio-ious  denominations,  but  it  recognizes  and  guaranties  to  all 
men  the  free  exercise  of  their  religion,  whatever  it  may  be.  It 
places  all  denominations,  however  great  or  however  small,  on 
the  same  footing,  before  the  state,  and  recognizes  the  equal 
rights  of  all  and  of  each.  To  this  the  faith  of  the  country  is 
pledged.  We  say  to  all,  of  all  creeds,  Come  here  and  demean 
yourselves,  in  civil  matters,  as  good  citizens,  and  your  respective 
faiths  and  modes  of  worship  shall  ail  alike  be  legally  respected 
and  protected.  This  is  what  we  have  professed ;  of  this  we  make 
our  boast ;  and  this  we  consider  our  chief  title  to  the  admira- 
tion of  the  world.  We  have  promised  to  all  the  fullest  con- 
ceivable religious  liberty.  For  this  we  have  solemnly  pledged 
our  faith  before  the  world  and  before  Heaven.  Are  we  pre- 
pared to  break  our  faith? 

But  in  getting  up  a  party  against  any  one  religious  denomi- 
nation, are  we  not  breaking  our  faith,  and  perjuring  oui-selves 
in  the  sight  of  God  and  of  men  ?  What  matters  it  to  honest 
men,  whether  we  do  this  directly  or  indirectly  ?  What  is  the 
difference  in  principle  between  passing  a  law  excluding,  under 
severe  penalties,  the  exercise  of  the  Catholic  religion  in  this 
country,  and,  by  our  political  and  other  combinations,  rendering 
its  exercise  impossible  ?  AVhat  is  the  difference  between  exclud- 
ing Catholics  directly,  and  treating  them,  in  such  a  manner  that 
they  will  be  forced  to  exclude  themselves  ? 

Then,  again,  the  wisdom  of  the  policy  of  combining  for  the 
expulsion  or  exclusion  of  Catholics  may  be  gravely  questioned. 
Where  there  is  a  multiplicity  of  denominations,  there  is  safety 
for  any  one  only  so  far  as  there  is  safety  for  all.  Combine  and 
suppress  Catholicity  to-day,  and  it  may  be  some  other  one's 
turn  to  be  suppressed  to-morrow.  The  precedent  established, 
the  Catholics  disposed  of,  a  new  combination  may  be  formed 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  431 

against  tlie  Methodists,  then  against  the  Baptists,  then  against 
the  Unitarians  and  Universahsts,  and  then  against  the  Episco- 
pahans,  or  for  the  revival  of  the  Ciassis  of  Amsterdam,  or  the 
Kirk  of  Scotland.  Cannot  all  see  that  the  safety  of  each  is  in 
protecting  all,  and  suffering  a  combination  to  be  formed  against 
none? 

Moreover,  why  should  Protestants  combine  against  Catholics  ? 
Have  they  not  the  Bible  and  private  reason  ?  and  with  these 
what  has  a  Protestant  to  apprehend  ?  Is  he  not  abundantly 
able  to  meet  and  vanquish  in  the  fair  field  of  controversy  the 
benighted  and  idolatrous  Papist  ?  Does  he  not  beheve  that  he 
has  truth,  reason,  and  revelation  on  his  side?  Does  he  not 
know  that  he  has  all  the  prejudices  and  nearly  nineteen  twen- 
tieths of  the  whole  population  of  the  country  on  his  side  ?  Are 
there  not  here  odds  enough  in  his  favor  ?  What,  then,  does  he 
fear  ?  With  all  these  advantages,  does  he  tremble  before  the 
Papist,  and  fear  the  meeting-house  may  give  place  to  the 
church,  the  table  to  the  altar,  the  bread  and  wine  to  the  Real 
Presence  ?  A  sorry  compliment  this  to  Protestantism  !  a  sorry 
compliment  to  reason,  to  distrust  its  encounter  with  error  in  open 
field  and  fair  combat !  Were  we  Protestants,  as  we  once  were, 
— but,  God  be  praised,  are  no  longer, — we  should  blush  to  ap- 
peal against  Poioery  to  any  other  arguments  than  Scripture  and 
reason.  If  with  these  we  could  not  resist  the  spread  of  Cath- 
olicity, we  should  be  led  to  distrust  the  sacredness  of  our  cause, 
and  to  fear,  that,  after  all,  we  had  not  the  Lord  on  our  side. 
These  political  combinations  betray  the  weakness  of  Protestant- 
ism, not  its  strength  ;  the  doubts,  not  the  faith,  of  its  upholders. 
If  they  are  right  in  their  premises,  they  need  not  these  com- 
binations to  suppress  Catholicity;  if  they  are  wrong  in  their 
premises,  then  they  are  warring,  not  against  a  superstition,  an 
idolatry,  as  they  pretend,  but  against  God,  and  we  leave  it  to 
them  to  decide  what  is  the  proper  name  by  which  they  should 
be  designated. 

But  we  are  told  that  Catholics  are  opposed,  not  because  they 
are  Catholics  simply,  but  because,  being  Catholics,  they  Giro 


432  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

allegiance  to  a  foreign  power,  and  therefore  cannot  be  good  citi- 
zens. No  Catholic,  it  is  assumed,  since  he  owes  allegiance  to 
the  Pope,  can  be  bound  by  any  obligation  he  may  contract  as  a 
citizen.  If  we  really  supposed  that  any  one  among  us  could  be 
so  simple  as  to  believe  this,  we  would  contradict  it.  But  there 
are  charges  too  absurd  to  need  a  reply.  The  Catholic  does,  in- 
deed, owe  allegiance  to  the  Pope  as  the  visible  head  of  the 
Church,  but  not  as  visible  head  of  the  state.  Whoever  knows 
any  thing  at  all  of  the  obligation  of  the  Catholic  to  the  success- 
or of  St.  Peter  knows  that  it  would  be  as  absurd  to  conclude 
that  the  Christian,  because  he  owes  allegiance  to  God,  cannot  be 
a  good  citizen,  nor  true  to  the  obligations  he  contracts  as  a  citi- 
zen to  the  state,  as  to  infer  that  a  Catholic  cannot  be  a  good  cit- 
izen because  he  owes  allegiance  to  the  visible  head  of  his  Church. 
So  for  as  this  allegiance  is  a  fact,  and  so  far  as  it  is  operative  on 
the  heart  and  conscience  of  a  Catholic,  it  binds  him  to  be  a 
peaceful  and  obedient  subject  to  the  state,  a  faithful  and  consci- 
entious citizen 

But  the  Roman  Catholic  religion,  we  are  further  told,  is  in- 
compatible with  republicanism,  hostile  to  popular  institutions ; 
from  which  it  is  to  be  inferred,  we  suppose,  that  Protestantism, 
as  the  negative  of  Catholicity,  is  compatible  with  republican  in- 
stitutions and  friendly  to  popular  freedom.  It  would,  perhaps, 
be  difficult  to  prove  this.  The  most  despotic  states  in  Europe 
are  the  Protestant,  and  in  Switzerland,  for  instance,  the  Catholic 
cantons  are  the  most  democratic.  Despotism  was  hardly  known 
in  Europe  ])rior  to  the  Reformation,  save  in  that  portion  not  in 
communion  with  the  Church  of  Rome ;  and  we  very  much  doubt 
if  there  be  at  this  moment  as  much  popular  freedom  in  the  Prot- 
estant states  of  Europe  as  there  was  in  the  twelfth,  thirteenth, 
and  fourteenth  centuries.  There  are  really  fewer  checks  on  ar- 
bitrary power,  and  there  is  more  heartless  oppression. 

In  this  country,  the  only  republican  government  that  Protest- 
antism can  pretend  ever  to  have  founded  has  been  established, 
but  it  has  not  been  founded  solely  by  Protestantism.  It  owes 
it&  origin  to  the  circumstances  in  which  tlie  first  settlers  csmc 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  433 

here,  and  to  the  impossibility,  after  independence  of  the  crown 
of  Great  Britain  was  proclaimed,  of  establishing  any  other  than 
a  republican  form  of  government.  We  have  existed  as  a  repub- 
lic between  sixty  and  seventy  years.  But  it  needs  no  very  sharp 
observation  to  perceive  that  our  republic  has  virtually  failed  to 
accomplish  the  hopes  of  its  founders,  and  that  it  is,  without  some 
notable  change  in  the  people,  destined  either  to  a  speedy  disso- 
lution, or  to  sink  into  a  miserable  timocracy,  infinitely  worse  than 
the  most  absolute  despotism.  Protestantism,  if  it  could  origi- 
nate, has  not  proved  itself  able  to  sustain  it. 

We  need  but  glance  at  our  electioneering  contests,  becoming 
fiercer  and  fiercer,  more  and  more  demorahzing,  with  each  suc- 
ceeding election,  to  be  convinced  of  this.  The  election  of  our 
presidents  costs  us  more  than  the  whole  civil  list  of  Great  Brit- 
ain. We  have  heard  it  suggested  that  the  election  of  General 
Harrison  cost  the  Whigs  more  than  fifty  millions  of  dollars,  the 
expenditures  of  the  opposite  party  in  attempting  to  reelect  Mr. 
Van  Buren  were  no  trifle.  Hardly  less  has  been  expended  in 
the  campaign  just  closed.  This  is  a  tax  no  people  can  bear  for 
any  great  length  of  time,  without  ruin,  and  the  complete  pros- 
tration of  public  and  pi'ivate  morality. 

Protestantism,  by  its  principle, — liberty  of  private  judgment, 
— may  undoubtedly  seem  to  favor  civil  freedom  ;  and  that  it 
often  attempts  to  establish  free  popular  institutions  we  do  not 
deny ;  but  it  wants  the  virtue  to  sustain  them.  By  this  same 
principle,  it  multiplies  sects  without  number,  and  virtually  des- 
troys, by  dividing,  the  moral  force  of  the  nation.  We  see  this 
with  ourselves.*  Religion  has  little  force  in  controlling  our  pas- 
sions or  pursuits.  No  one  of  the  sects  possesses  a  commanding 
influence  over  the  people.  The  great  mass  of  the  people  are 
left,  therefore,  to  the  corrupt  passions  of  their  own  depraved  na- 
ture. They  cease  to  live  for  God,  and  live  only  for  the  world, — 
to  live  for  eternity,  and  live  only  for  time.  They  become  wed 
ded  to  things  of  this  world,  their  hearts  bent  only  on  wealth  and 
honors.  In  business  the  ruling  passion  is  to  get  rich,  in  public 
hfe  to  rise  to  places  of  honor  and  emolument,  in  private  life  to 


434  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

gain  ease  and  pleasure.  Now,  how  long  can  a  government, 
which  rests  for  its  existence  on  the  virtue  and  intelligence  of  the 
people,  exist,  or,  if  exist,  answer  its  end,  in  a  community  where 
the  great  mass  of  the  people  are  carried  away  by  the  dominant 
passions,  wealth,  place,  and  pleasure  ? 

We  may  be  told  that  enlightened  self-interest  will  suffice, — 
that  only  instruct  the  people  what  is  for  their  interest,  and  they 
will  do  it.  This  is  plausible,  but  all  experience  proves  to  the 
contrary.  Who  does  not  know  that  it  is  for  his  real  interest, 
both  for  time  and  eternity,  to  be  a  devout  Christian  ?  And  yet 
are  all  devout  Christians  ?  The  wisdom  and  prudence  of  men's 
conduct  cannot  be  measured  by  their  intelhgence.  A  corrupt 
man  uses  his  intelligence  only  as  the  minister  of  his  corruption. 
The  more  you  extend  intelligence,  unless  you  extend  the  moral 
restraints  and  influences  of  the  gospel  at  the  same  time,  the 
more  do  you  sharpen  the  intellect  for  evil.  The  people  of  the 
United  States  are  far  more  instructed  than  they  were  fifty  years 
ao-o,  and  yet  liave  not  half  so  much  of  the  virtue  necessary  to 
sustain  a  republican  government.  We  are  never  to  expect  men 
to  act  virtuously,  simply  because  their  understandings  are  con- 
vinced that  virtue  is  the  best  calculation.  You  must  make  them 
act  from  a  higher  motive.  They  must  be  governed  by  religion ; 
act  from  the  love  and  the  fear  of  God, — from  a  deep  sense  of 
duty;  be  meek,  liumblc,  self-denying;  morally  brave  and  he- 
roic •  choosing  rather  to  die  a  thousand  deaths  than  swerve  from 
right  principle,  or  disobey  the  will  of  God;  or  they  will  not 
practise  the  virtues  without  which  liberty  is  an  empty  name, — a 
mere  illusion.  • 

Now,  Protestantism  never  has,  and  never  can,  produce  the  vir- 
tues without  which  a  republican  government  can  have  no  solid 
foundation.  It  may  have  good  words;  it  may  say  wise  and 
even  just  things :  but  it  wants  the  unction  of  the  spirit.  It 
does  not  reach  and  regenerate  the  heart,  subdue  the  passions, 
and  renew  the  spirit.  It  has  never  produced  a  single  saint,  and 
the  virtues  it  calls  forth  are  of  the  sort  exhibited  by  the  old 
heathen  moralists.     It  praises  the  Bible,  but  studies  the  Greek 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 


435 


and  Roman  classics;  boasts  of  spirituality,  but  expires  in  a  vain 
formalism.     For  the  three  hundred  years  it  has  existed,  it  has 
proved  itself  powerful  to  destroy,  but  impotent  to  found ;  ready 
to  begin,  but  never  able  to  complete.     Whatever  it  claims  that 
is  positive,  abiding,  it  has  inherited  or  borrowed  from  the  ages 
and  the  lands  of  faith.     Its  own  creations  rise  and  vanish  as  the 
soap-bubbles  blown  by  our  children  in  their  sports.     It  has  never 
yet  shown  itself  able  to  command  human  nature,  or  to  say  to 
the  roused  waves  of  passion,  Peace,  be  still.     It  lulls  the  con- 
science with  the  forms  of  faith  and  piety  ;  soothes  vanity  and 
fosters  pride  by  its  professions  of  freedom ;  but  leaves  the  pas- 
sions all  their  natural  force,  and  permits  the  man  to  remain  a 
slave  to  all  his  natural  lusts.     It  never  subdues  or  regenerates 
nature.     Hence,  throughout  all  Protestantdom,  the  tendency  is, 
to  reproduce  heathen  antiquity,  with  all  its  cant,  hoUowness,  hy- 
pocrisy, slavery,  and  wretchedness, — to  narrow  men's  views  down 
to  this  transitory  life  and  the  fleeting  shows  of  sense,  and  to  make 
them  live  and  labor  for  the  meat  that  perisheth.     We  appeal  to 
England,  Sweden,  Denmark,  Protestant  Germany,  Holland,  and 
our  own   country,  for  the  truth  of  what  we  say.     They  were 
Protestant  traders  who  trampled  on  the  cross  of  Christ  to  gain 
the  lucrative  trade  of  Japan.     It  is  in  no  spirit  of  exultation  we ' 
allude  to  Protestant  worldly-mindedness  and  spiritual  impotency. 
Would  to  God  the  sketch  were  from  fancy,  or  our  own  diseased 
imagination ! 

We  do  not  mean  to  deny,  that,  in  w^ords,  Protestantism  teaches 
many,  perhaps  most,  of  the  Christian  virtues.  It  has  even  some 
good  books  on  morals  and  practical  religion.  Its  clergy  give 
good  exhortations,  and  labor,  no  doubt,  in  good  faith,  for  the 
spiritual  culture  of  their  flocks !  No  doubt,  much  truth,  much 
valuable  instruction,  is  given  from  Protestant  pulpits.  The  Prot- 
estant clergy  take  no  dehght  in  the  state  of  things  they  see 
around  them.  They  would  gladly  see  Christ  reign  in  the  hearts 
of  men ;  they,  no  doubt,  would  joyfully  dispense  the  bread  of 
life  to  their  famished  people  ;  and  they  do  dispense  the  best  they 
have.     But  alas !  how  can  they  dispense  what  they  have  not 


436  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

received  ?  The  living  bread  is  not  on  their  oommnnion  table. 
They  communicate,  according  to  their  own  confessioi),  only  a 
figure,  a  shadow  ;  and  how  shall  the  divine  life  be  nourished  with 
shadows  ?  What  we  mean  to  say  is,  not  that  Protestantism 
does  not  aim  to  bring  men  to  Christ,  to  make  them  pure  and 
holy,  but  that  it  has  no  power  to  do  it.  It  does  not  control 
human  nature,  and  produce  the  fruits  of  a  supernatural  faith, 
hope,  and  charity.  Its  faith  is  merely  an  opinion  or  persuasion, 
its  hope  a  wish,  and  its  charity  natural  philanthropy.  It  nec- 
essarily leaves  human  nature  as  it  finds  it,  and  no  pruning  of 
that  corrupt  tree  can  make  it  bring  forth  good  fruit.  It  is  of 
the  earth, — earthy;  and  it  will  bear  fruit  only  for  the  earth. 
With  unregenerated  nature  in  fall  activity,  we  can  have  only 
sensuality  and  mammon-worship. 

Hundreds  and  thousands  among  us,  who  are  by  no  means 
favorably  disposed  to  Catholicity,  see  this  and  deplore  it.  They 
say  the  age  has  no  faith.  They  see  the  impotency  of  Protest- 
antism ;  that  under  it  all  the  vices  are  sheltered  ;  that,  in  spite 
of  it,  all  the  dangerous  passions  rage  unchecked  ;  and  they  turn 
awav  in  disgust  from  its  empty  forms  and  vain  words.  Witness 
the  response  the  biting  sarcJisms  and  withering  irony  of  Carlyle 
brings  from  thousands  of  hearts  in  this  republic,  the  echoes 
which  the  chiselled  words  and  marble  sentences  of  Emerson  also 
orino-.  Witness,  also,  the  movements  of  the  Come-outers,  the 
Socialists,  Fourierists,  Communists.  All  these  see  that  Protest- 
antism has  notliing  but  words,  while  they  want  life,  realities,  not 
vain  simulacra.  They  err  most  egregiously,  no  doubt ;  they  go 
from  the  dying  to  the  dead  ;  but  their  error  proves  the  truth  of 
what  we  advance. 

Now,  assuming  our  view  of  Protestantism  to  be  correct,  we 
demand  how  it  is  to  sustain,  or  we,  with  it  alone,  are  to  sustain 
our  republican  government.  Do  we  not  see,  in  this  growing 
love  of  place  and  plunder,  with  this  growing  devotion  to  wealth, 
luxury,  and  pleasure,  with  these  fierce  electioneering  contests, 
one  no  sooner  ended  than  another  begins,  each  to  be  fiercer  and 
more  absorbing  and  more  destructive  than  the  last,  and  each 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  437 

drawing  within  its  vortex  nearly  the  whole  industrial  interest  of 
the  country,  and  touching  almost  every  man  in  his  honor  and 
his  purse,  that  we  want  the  moral  elements  without  which  a 
republic  cannot  stand  ?  A  republic  can  stand  only  as  it  rests 
upon  the  virtues  of  the  people ;  and  these  not  the  mere  natural 
virtues  of  wordly  prudence  and  social  decency,  but  those  loftier 
virtues  which  are  possible  to  human  nature  only  as  elevated 
above  itself  by  the  infused  habit  of  supernatural  grace.  This  is 
a  solemn  fact  to  which  it  is  in  vain  for  us  to  close  our  eyes. 
Human  nature  left  to  itself  tends  to  dissolution,  to  desti-uction, 
decay,  death.  So  does  every  society  that  rests  only  on  those 
virtues  wdiich  have  their  origin,  growth,  and  maturity  in  nature 
alone.  This  is  the  case  with  our  own  society.  We  have  really 
no  social  bond ;  w^e  have  no  true  patriotism ;  none  of  that 
patience,  that  self-denial,  that  loyalty  of  soul,  which  is  necessary 
to  bind  man  to  man,  each  to  each,  and  each  to  all.  Each  is  for 
himself.  Save  who  can  [Sauve  qui  j^eitt),  we  exclaim.  Hence 
a  universal  scramble.  Man  overthrows  man,  brother  brother, 
the  father  the  child,  and  the  child  the  father,  the  demagogue 
all ;  while  the  devil  stands  at  a  distance,  looks  on,  and  enjoys 
the  sport.  Tell  us,  ye  who  boast  of  the  glorious  Reformation, 
if  a  republican  form  of  government  is  compatible  with  this  moral 
state  of  the  people  ? 

Even  in  matters  of  education  we  can  do  little  but  sharpen 
the  wit,  and  render  brother  more  skilful  and  successful  in  plun- 
derino-  brother.  With  our  multitude  of  sects,  we  may  instruct, 
but  not  educate.  Our  children  can  have  no  moral  training,  for 
morality  rests  on  theology,  and  theology  on  faith.  But  faith  is 
expelled  from  our  schools,  because  it  is  sectarian,  and  there  is 
no  one  faith  in  the  country  which  can  be  taught  without  excit- 
ino-  the  jealousy  of  the  followers  of  a  rival  faith.  Cut  up  into 
such  a  multitude  of  sects,  there  is  and  can  be  no  common  moral 
culture  in  the  country,  no  true  religious  training.  We  give  a 
little  instruction  in  reading,  writing,  arithmetic,  grammar,  geog- 
raphy, perhaps  history,  the  Greek  and  Roman  classics,  and  in 
the  physical  sciences ;  and  send  our  children  out  into  the  world, 


438  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

to  form  tlieir  morals  and  their  religion  without  other  guide  or 
assistant  than  their  own  short-sighted  reason  and  perverted 
passions.  How  can  we  expect  any  thing  from  such  a  sowing, 
but  what  we  reap?  and  how,  under  Protestantism,  which 
broaches  every  thing,  and  settles  nothing,  raises  all  questions 
and  answers  none,  and  therefore  necessarily  giving  birth  to  a 
perpetual  succession  of  sects,  each  claiming  with  equal  i-eason 
and  justice  to  have  the  truth,  and  the  claims  of  all  equally  re- 
spected, as  they  must  be,  by  the  government,  is  this  terrible 
evil  to  be  remedied?  Protestantism  is  just  a-going  to  remedy 
it ;  but,  ala-s !  it  does  not  succeed.  It  reminds  us  of  a  remark 
by  a  lady  eating  vegetable  oysters, —  "I  always  seem,  when  I 
eat  vegetable  oysters,  as  if  I  was  just  a-going  to  taste  of  an 
oyster."  So,  when  we  examine  Protestantism,  hear  its  loud 
professions,  witness  its  earnest  strivings,  and  observe  each  new 
sect  it  gives  birth  to,»  we  say  it  is  the  lady  eating  vegetable 
oysters.  It  seems  to  itself  that  it  is  just  going  to  light  upon  the 
truth,  and  to  hit  upon  some  plan  by  which  it  can  remove  the 
terrible  evils  it  sees  and  dtiplores,  and  call  forth  the  virtues  it 
owns  to  be  necessaiy  ;  but,  alas  !  it  is  only  just  a-going  to  t:iste 
the  oyster :  it  never  quite  tastes  if. 

These  lixcts,  which  we  mention,  are  seen  and  felt  by  large 
numbers  in  our  midst.  Quiet,  peaceable,  but  observing  and  re- 
flecting men  look  on  and  observe  our  doings,  and  say  to  them- 
selves, "This  repubhcanism,  after  all,  is  a  mere  delusion.  It 
is  all  very  fine,  no  doubt,  in  theory,  but  exceedingly  hateful  in 
practice.  Washington,  and  Hamilton,  and  others,  were  wiser 
than  Jefferson  and  Madison.  So  large  a  republic,  Avith  such 
frequency  of  elections,  and  so  many  thousands  depending  on 
the  fate  of  an  election  for  their  very  means  of  subsistence,  so 
many  iiis  afraid  of  being  turned  out,  so  many  outs  anxious  to 
be  turned  in,  and  the  number  each  year  increasing  with  the  ex- 
tent and  population  of  the  country, — well,  let  the  republic  stand 
if  it  can,  but  a  change  to  a  monarchy  will  soon  be  inevitable." 
There  are  men  who  so  reason,  and  they  are  neither  few  nor  des- 
picable ;  nor  are  they  fairly  answered  by  our  Fourth  of  July 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  430 

glorifications,  or  hurrahs  for  Democracy,  Vive  la  Repuhlique  I 
Vive  la  Democratie!  Vive  la  Liberie!  We  do  not  agree 
with  them ; — far  from  it ;  but  we  should  agree  with  them,  if  we 
saw  nothing  better  for  our  republic  than  Protestantism.  Prot- 
estants as  they  are,  we  say  they  reason  correctly,  and  if  the  re- 
ligion of  the  country  remains  Protestant  for  fifty  years  longer, 
facts  will  prove  it. 

But  with  Catholicity  the  republic  may  be  sustained,  not  be- 
cause the  Catholic  Church  enjoins  this  form  of  government  or 
that,  but  because  she  nourishes  in  the  hearts  of  her  children  the 
virtues  which  render  popular  liberty  both  desirable  and  practica- 
ble. The  Catholic  Church  meddles  directly  with  no  form  of 
government.  She  leaves  each  people  free  to  adopt  such  form 
of  government  as  seems  to  themselves  good,  and  to  administer 
it  in  their  own  way.  Her  chief  concern  is  to  fit  men  for  beati- 
tude, and  this  she  can  do  under  any  or  all  forms  of  government. 
But  the  spirit  she  breathes  into  men,  the  graces  she  communi- 
cates, the  dispositions  she  cultivates,  and  the  virtues  she  pro- 
duces, are  such,  that,  while  they  render  even  arbitrary  forms  of 
government  tolerable,  fit  a  people  for  asserting  and  maintaining 
freedom.  In  countries  where  there  are  no  constitutional  checks 
on  power,  she  remedies  the  evil  by  imposing  moral  restraints  on 
its  exercise,  by  inspiring  rulers  with  a  sense  of  justice  and  the 
public  good.  Where  such  checks  do  exist,  she  hallows  them 
and  renders  them  in\"iolable.  In  a  republic  she  restrains  the 
passions  of  the  people,  teaches  them  obedience  to  the  laws  of 
God,  moderates  their  desires,  weans  their  aflfections  from  the 
world,  frees  them  from  the  dominion  of  their  own  lusts,  and,  by 
the  meekness,  humility,  loyalty  of  heart  which  she  cherishes, 
disposes  them  to  the  practice  of  those  public  \irtues  which  ren- 
der a  republic  secure.  She  also  creates  by  her  divine  charity  a 
true  equality.  No  republic  can  stand  where  the  dominant  feel- 
ing is  pride,  which  finds  its  expression  in  the  assertion  "  I  am  as 
good  as  you."  It  must  be  based  on  love  ;  not  on  the  determi- 
nation to  defend  our  own  rights  and  interests,  but  on  the  fear  tc 
encroach  on  the  rights  and  interests  of  others.     But  this  love 


440  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

must  be  more  than  the  mere  sentiment  of  philanthropy.  This 
sentiment  of  philanthropy  is  a  very  unsubstantial  affair.  Talk 
as  we  will  about  its  excellence,  it  never  goes  beyond  love  to 
those  who  love  us.  AYe  love  our  friends  and  neighbors,  but 
hate  our  enemies.  This  is  all  we  do  as  philanthropists.  All  the 
fine  speeches  we  make  beyond — about  the  love  of  humanity,  and 
all  that — are  fine  speeches.  Philanthropy  must  be  exalted  into 
the  supernatural  virtue  of  charity,  before  it  can  become  that  love 
which  leads  us  to  honor  all  men,  and  makes  us  shrink  from  en- 
croaching upon  the  interests  of  any  man,  no  matter  how  low  or 
how  vile.  We  must  love  our  neighbor,  not  for  his  own  sake, 
but  for  God's  sake, — the  child,  for  the  sake  of  the  Father  ;  then 
we  can  love  all,  and  joyfully  make  the  most  painful  sacrifices  for 
them.  It  is  only  in  the  bosom  of  the  Catholic  Church  that  this 
subhme  charity  has  ever  been  found  or  can  be  found. 

The  Catholic  Church  also  cherishes  a  spirit  of  independence, 
a  loftiness  and  dignity  of  soul,  favorable  to  the  maintenance  of 
popular  freedom.  It  ennobles  every  one  of  its  members.  The 
lowest,  the  humblest  Catholic  is  a  member  of  that  Church  which 
was  founded  by  Jesus  Christ  himself;  which  has  subsisted  for 
eighteen  hundred  years ;  which  has  in  every  age  been  blessed 
with  signal  tokens  of  the  Redeemer's  love ;  which  counts  its 
saints  by  millions  ;  and  the  blood  of  whose  martyrs  has  made 
all  earth  hallowed  ground.  He  is  admitted  into  the  goodly 
fellowship  of  the  faithful  of  all  ages  and  climes,  and  every  day, 
throughout  all  the  earth,  the  Univei-sal  Church  sends  up  her 
prayei-s  for  him,  and  all  the  Church  above  receive  them,  and, 
with  their  own,  bear  them  as  sweet  incense  up  before  the  throne 
of  the  almighty  and  eternal  God.  He  is  a  true  nobleman,  more 
than  the  peer  of  kings  or  Csesars ;  for  he  is  a  child  of  the  King 
of  kings,  and,  if  fiiithful  unto  death,  heir  of  a  crown  of  life,  eter- 
nal in  the  heavens,  that  fadeth  not  away.  Such  a  man  is  no 
slave.  His  soul  is  free  ;  he  looks  into  the  perfect  law  of  liberty. 
Can  tyrants  enslave  him  ?  No,  indeed ;  not  because  he  will 
turn  on  the  tyrant  and  kill,  but  because  he  can  die  and  reign 
for  ever.     What  were  a  mere  human  tyrant  before  a  nation  of 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  441 

such  men  ?  Who  could  establish  arbitrary  government  over 
them,  or  subject  them  to  unwholesome  or  iniquitous  laws  ? 

Here  is  our  hope  for  our  republic.  We  look  for  our  safety  to 
the  spread  of  Catholicity.  We  render  solid  and  imperishable 
our  free  institutions  just  in  proportion  as  we  extend  the  kingdom 
of  God  among  our  people,  and  establish  in  their  hearts  the  reign 
of  justice  and  charity.  And  here,  then,  is  our  answer  to  those 
who  tell  us  Catholicity  is  incompatible  with  free  institutions. 
We  tell  them  that  they  cannot  maintain  free  institutions  without 
it.  It  is  not  a  free  government  that  makes  a  free  people,  but  a 
free  people  that  makes  a  free  government ;  and  we  know  no 
freedom  but  that  wherewith  the  Son  makes  free.  You  must  be 
free  w^ithin,  before  you  can  be  free  without.  They  who  war 
against  the  Church,  because  they  fancy  it  hostile  to  their  civil 
freedom,  are  as  mad  as  those  wicked  Jews  who  nailed  their  Re- 
deemer to  the  cross.  But  even  now,  as  then,  God  be  thanked, 
from  the  cross  ascends  the  prayer,  not  in  vain,  "  Father,  forgive 
them,  for  they  know  not  what  they  do." 

As  to  the  eflfect  this  Native  American  party  may  have  on  the 
Church,  or  the  cause  of  Catholicity  in  this  country,  we  have  no 
fears.  We  know  it  is  a  party  formed  for  the  suppression  of  the 
Catholic  Church  in  our  land.  Protestantism,  afraid  to  meet 
the  champions  of  the  cross  in  fair  and  open  debate,  conscious 
of  her  weakness  or  unskil fulness  in  argument,  true  to  her  an- 
cient instincts,  resorts  to  the  civil  arm,  and  hopes  by  a  series  of 
indirect  legislation — for  she  dare  not  attempt  as  yet  any  direct 
legislation — to  maintain  her  predominance.  But  this  gives  us 
no  uneasiness.  We  know  in  whom  we  believe,  and  are  certain. 
We  see  these  movements,  we  comprehend  their  aim,  and  we 
merely  ask  in  the  words  of  the  Psalmist,  "  Why  have  the  Gen- 
tiles raged,  and  the  people  devised  vain  things  ?  The  kings  of 
the  earth  stood  up,  and  the  princes  met  together,  against  the 
Lord,  and  against  his  Christ.  Let  us  break  their  bands  asun- 
der, and  let  us  cast  their  yoke  from  us.  He  that  dwelleth  in 
the  heavens  shall  laugh  at  them,  and  the  Lord  shall  deride 
them.     Then  shall  he  speak  to  them  in  his  anger,  and  trouble 


442  NATIVE    AMERICANISM. 

them  in  his  rage."  Ps.  ii.  1-5.  They  wage  an  unequal  con- 
test who  wage  war  against  the  Church  of  the  Living  God,  who 
hatli  said  to  its  Head,  "  Thou  art  my  Son,  this  day  have  I  be- 
gotten thee.  Ask  of  me  and  I  will  give  thee  the  Gentiles  for  thy 
inheritance,  and  the  utmost  parts  of  the  earth  for  thy  posses- 
sions." lb.,  7,  S.  These  may  combine  to  put  down  Catholicity 
form  leagues  against  it,  enlist  all  the  powers  of  the  earth  against 
it ;  but  what  then  ?  Nero  tried  to  crush  it  in  its  infancy.  Dio- 
cletian tried  it.  And  Nero  and  Diocletian  have  passed  away, 
and  their  mighty  empire  has  crumbled  to  pieces  and  dissolved, 
leaving  scarce  "  a  wrack  behind ;"  yet  the  Church  has  lived  on, 
and  the  successor  of  the  fisherman  of  Galilee  inherited  a  power 
before  which  that  of  Rome  in  her  proudest  day  was  merely  the 
dust  in  the  balance.  Pagan  and  Saracen  tried  to  crush  it,  but 
Pagan  and  Saracen  are  scattered  before  its  glory  as  the  morn- 
ing mist  before  the  rising  sun.  Heretic  and  schismatic  have 
tried  to  exterminate  it, — Luther,  and  Calvin,  and  Henry  of 
England,  like  the  great  dragon  whose  tail  drew  after  it  a  third 
part  of  the  stare  of  heaven ;  and  their  own  children  are  rising 
up  and  cursing  their  memory.  The  powers  of  the  earth  have 
tried  to  do  it, — Napoleon,  the  Colossus  who  bestrided  Europe, 
and  made  and  unmade  kings  in  mere  pastime ;  but  Napoleon, 
from  the  moment  he  dared  lay  his  hand  on  the  Lord's  anointed, 
loses  his  power,  and  goes  to  die  at  last  of  a  broken  heart  in  a 
barren  isle  of  the  ocean.  Jew,  Pagan,  Saracen,  heretic,  schis- 
matic, infidel,  and  lawless  power  have  all  tried  their  hand  against 
the  Church.  The  Lord  has  held  them  in  derision.  He  has  been 
a  wall  of  fire  round  about  her,  and  proved  for  eighteen  hundred 
years  that  no  weapen  formed  against  her  shall  prosper ;  for  he 
guards  the  honor  of  his  Spouse  as  his  own.  Let  the  ark  appear 
to  jostle,  if  it  will ;  we  reach  forth  no  hand  to  steady  it,  and 
fear  no  harm  that  may  come  to  it.  The  Church  has  survived 
all  storms ;  it  is  founded  upon  a  rock,  and  the  gates  of  hell  are 
impotent  against  it.  It  is  not  for  the  friends  of  the  Church  to 
fear,  but  for  those  who  war  against  her,  and  seek  her  suppres- 
sion.    It  is  for  them  to  tremble, — not  before  the  arm  of  man, 


NATIVE    AMERICANISM.  443 

for  no  human  arm  will  be  raised  against  them  ;  but  before  that 
God  whose  Church  they  outrage,  and  whose  cause  they  seek  to 
crush.  The  Lord  hath  promised  his  Son  the  Gentiles  for  his 
inheritance,  and  the  utmost  parts  of  the  earth  for  his  possession. 
He  must  and  will  have  this  nation.  And  throughout  all  the 
length  and  breadth  of  this  glorious  land  shall  his  temples  rise 
to  catch  the  morning  sun  and  reflect  his  evening  rays,  and  holy 
altars  shall  be  erected,  and  the  "  clean  sacrifice"  shall  be  offered 
daily,  and  a  delighted  people  shall  bow  in  humility  before  them, 
and  pour  out  their  hearts  in  joyous  thanksgiving ;  for  so  hath 
the  Lord  spoken,  and  his  word  shall  stand. 

So  far  as  the  spread  of  Cathohcity  in  this  country  is  concern- 
ed, we  look  upon  this  anti-Catholic  party  with  no  apprehension. 
If  we  deprecate  the  formation  of  such  a  party,  it  is  for  the  sake 
of  those  misguided  citizens  who  may  unite  to  form  it.     It  is 
because  we  see  the  terrible  injustice  of  which  they  render  them- 
selves guilty,  and   the   awful  judgments   they  may  provoke. 
We  say  to  them,  as  St.  Justin  Martyr  said  to  the  Roman 
emperors,  "Take  heed  how  you  hearken  only  to  unjust  ac- 
cusations ;  fear  lest  an  excessive  complaisance  for  superstitious 
men,  a  haste  as  blind  as  rash,  old  prejudices  which  have  no 
foundation  but  calumny,  may  cause  you  to  pronounce  a  terrible 
sentence  against  yourselves.     As  for  us,  nobody  can  harm  us, 
unless  we  harm  ourselves,  unless  we  oui*selves  become  guilty  of 
some  injustice.     You  may  indeed  kill  us,  but  you  cannot  injure 
us."     It  is  for  our  countrymen,  who  will  render  themselves 
guilty  of  gross  wrong,  of  terrible  sin,  that  we  fear.     They  are 
eno-ao-ed  in  an  unholy  cause,  and,  if  they  persist,  cannot  fail  to 
draw  down  the  judgments  of  Almighty  God  upon  their  guilty 
heads.     They  can  shoot  us  down  in  the  streets ;  they  may  break 
up  our  schools  and  seminaries ;  they  may  desecrate  and  burn 
our  churches.     Such  things  have  been,  and  may  be  again ;  but 
it  becomes  those  who  have  been  and  may  be  the  perpetrators 
of  such  things  to  pause  and  ask  themselves  what  manner  of 
spirit  they  are  of;  and  how,  in  that  day  of  solemn  reckoning 
which  must  come  to  us  all,  they  will  answer  the  inexorable 


444  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

Judge  for  their  abuse,  their  riots,  their  murder,  and  their  sacri- 
lege. As  they  love  their  own  souls,  and  desire  good,  we  entreat 
them  to  beware  how  they  plunge  deeper  in  sin,  and  rekindle 
the  torch  of  persecution.  For  their  sakes,  not  for  ours,  we  pray 
them  to  pause  before  they  go  farther,  and  make  their  peace  witU 
the  Son  of  God. 


LABOR  AND   ASSOCIATION.* 

JANUARY,     1848. 

Unless  the  estimable  and  accomplished  translator  has  greatly 
improved  upon  his  author,  M.  Briancourt  is  one  of  the  most 
agreeable  writers  attached  to  the  school  of  Association  with 
whom  we  are  acquainted.  He  appears  to  be  sincere,  earnest, 
gentle,  and  philanthropic ;  and  he  writes  with  ability,  ease,  vi- 
vacity, and  grace.  His  pages  have,  comparatively,  httle  of  that 
barbarous  terminology  which  renders  the  writers  of  the  Associ- 
ationists,  in  general,  so  forbidding  to  all  but  adepts.  If  we  had 
the  least  conceivable  sympathy  with  his  doctrines  and  schemes, 
we  could  read  him  with  pleasure,  and,  at  times,  with  admiration ; 
and  we  cannot  but  regard  his  little  work  as  the  best  summary 
of  the  plans  and  hopes  of  his  school  which  has  as  yet  appeared. 

But  the  more  able,  skilful,  and  fascinating  is  a  writer,  the 
more  dangerous  and  carefully  to  be  eschewed  are  his  writings, 
if  devoted  to  the  propagation  of  false  and  mischievous  theories. 
Error,  though  reason  be  free  to  combat  it,  is  never  harmless,  any 
more  than  poison,  because  its  antidote  may  be  known  and  at 
hand.  It  may,  upon  the  whole,  be  more  prudent  to  allow  it 
free  course,  than,  by  attempting  its  suppression  by  force,  to  run 
the  risk  of  also  suppressing  the  truth  ;  but  however  that  may  or 

*  Organization  of  Labor  and  Association.  By  Math.  Briancourt. 
Translated  by  Francis  Geo.  Shaw.  Vew  York  :  VVm.  H.  fJraham, 
1847.     16mo.     pp.  103. 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION'.  445 

may  not  be,  tlie  publication  of  error  is  always  an  evil  wLich  no 
freedom  of  its  contradictory  truth  can  ever  wholly  prevent  or 
overcome.  No  man  ever  puts  forth  a  system  of  unmixed  false- 
hood ;  and  the  currency  his  error  gains  is  always  by  virtue  of 
the  truth  he  mixes  with  it,  and  which  he  misinterprets  and  mis- 
applies. To  unravel  his  web  of  sophistry,  to  pick  out  his  tangled 
yarn,  or  separate  what  is  true  from  what  is  false,  is  a  task  of  no 
small  difficulty,  and  requires  a  patience  of  investigation,  habits 
of  nice  discrimination  and  of  close  and  rigid  reasoning,  which 
can  be  expected  only  from  the  gifted  and  thoroughly  disciplined 
few,  and  rarely  even  from  these.  An  error  may  be  stated  in  a 
few  words,  in  a  popular  form,  and  clothed  with  a  brilliant  and 
captivating  dress,  which,  nevertheless,  is  not  to  be  refuted,  nor 
its  truth,  which  gives  it  currency,  separated  from  the  falsehood 
which  renders  it  mischievous,  without  long,  elaborate,  and  abs- 
truse reasoning,  subtile  distinctions,  and  exact  definitions,  beyond 
the  capacity  of  the  generality,  usually  held  by  them  in  detesta- 
tion, and  of  which  they  are  always  impatient.  But  even  if  the 
refutation  could  be  presented  in  a  popular  form,  the  majority  of 
those  who  have  embraced  the  error  would  not  profit  by  it. 
Having  adopted  the  error  and  committed  themselves  to  it,  they 
are  unwilling  to  listen  to  any  thing  which  may  be  urged  against 
it,  lest  perchance  it  may  disturb  the  tranquillity  of  their  convic- 
tion, mortify  their  pride,  or  affect  unfavorably  their  reputation. 
Hence  it  is  that  nothing  is  more  difficult  than  to  recall  or  re- 
press an  error  once  fairly  in  circulation.  Hence  it  is  that  we  can 
never  allow  ourselves  to  commend  a  work,  however  kindly  dis- 
posed we  may  be  towards  its  author,  which,  in  our  judgment,  or 
according  to  the  rule  of  judgment  w^e  are  bound  to  follow, 
teaches  a  false  doctrine  or  proposes  a  visionary  scheme.  The 
reading  of  such  works,  when  not  absolutely  hurtful,  is  unprofita- 
ble, and  no  man  can  justify  it,  unless  it  be  to  refute  them,  and 
guard  the  public  against  their  dangerous  tendencies.  The  Asso- 
ciationists,  then,  must  not  be  surprised,  if  we  notice  Mr.  Brian- 
court's  work  only  to  censure  it. 

That  Mr.  Briancourt's  doctrine  is  unsound,  no  argument  is 


446  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

needed  to  prove.  No  man,  who  proposes  a  doctrine  which  re- 
vei-ses  all  that  has  hitherto  been  regarded  as  settled,  is  ever  en- 
titled even  to  a  hearing.  He  who,  on  his  own  authority,  gives 
the  lie  to  all  men,  of  all  ages  and  nations,  gives  to  every  man 
the  best  of  all  possible  human  reasons  for  giving  the  he  to  him. 
If  reason  is  to  be  trusted,  the  reason  of  all  ages  and  nations 
overrides  his  ;  if  it  is  not  to  be  trusted,  he  has  no  authority  for 
what  he  proposes.  He  places  himself  in  an  awkward  position, 
who,  asserting  the  authority  of  reason,  yet  opposes  his  own  rea- 
son to  the  reason  of  all  men.  He  must  be  a  bold  man,  a  man 
of  unbounded  self-confidence,  the  very  subhme  of  egotism,  who 
dares  pretend,  that,  on  his  reason  alone,  the  whole  world  may 
be  rationally  convicted  of  having  blundered.  They  have  all  the 
attiibutes  he  can  claim ;  why,  then,  assume  that  they  have  all 
blundered,  and  that  he  alone  has  hit  upon  the  truth  ?  Truth  is 
revealed  to  the  humble  and  childlike,  not  to  the  proud  and  arro- 
gant ;  and  who  is  prouder  or  more  arrogant  than  he  who  claims 
to  be  superior  to  all  men,  to  be  the  only  man  of  his  race  who 
has  perceived  what  is  true  and  good  ? 

Discoveries,  like  the  one  Fourier  professes  to  have  made,  are 
not  in  the  order  of  human  experience.  There  is  nothing  to  be 
found  in  the  experience  of  the  race  analogous  to  them.  Discov- 
eries, which  reverse  what  the  race  had  hitherto  regarded  as  the 
settled  order,  have  never  yet,  so  far  as  history  goes,  been  made 
in  any  department  of  life, — in  religion,  in  morals,  in  politics,  or 
in  social  and  industrial  arrangements.  Every  man,  who  has 
come  forward  with  any  such  pretended  discovery,  has  failed  to 
gain  a  verdict  in  his  favor,  and  in  the  judgment  of  mankind  has 
been  finally  condemned  either  as  deceiving  or  as  deceived,  or 
both  at  once.  M.  Charles  Fourier,  a  man,  if  you  will,  of  an  ex- 
traordinary intellect,  and  of  philanthropic  aims, — although,  we 
confess,  we  find  in  his  writings  only  wild  extravagance,  and  a 
pride,  an  egotism,  which  amount  very  nearly,  if  not  quite,  to 
insanity, — professes,  not,  indeed,  to  have  invented,  but  to  have 
discovered,  the  law  of  a  new  social  and  industrial  world.  This 
law  he  professes  to  have  drawn  out  and  scientifically  established 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  447 

in  all  its  ramifications ;  and  he  and  his  followers  propose  to  re- 
organize society  and  industry  according  to  its  provisions.  Simi- 
lar pretensions  have  often  been  made,  now  in  one  department 
of  hfe,  now  in  another ;  but  has  one  of  them  ever  succeeded  ? 
Is  there  one  of  them  that  has  not  been  finally  adjudged,  at  best, 
to  be  only  visionary  ?  Is  there  on  record  a  single  instance  of  a 
fundamental  reorganization  of  society,  industry,  or  even  of  gov- 
ernment, that  has  ever  been  effected  ?  Have  not  all  who  have 
labored  for  such  reorganization  been  opposed  by  their  age  and 
nation  ?  And  can  the  Associationists  name  an  instance  in  which 
posterity  has  reversed  the  judgment  of  contemporaries  ?  They 
cannot  do  it.  We  are  aware  of  the  instances  they  will  cite  ;  but 
not  one  of  them  is  to  the  purpose.  Why,  then,  suppose  the 
whole  order  of  human  experience  is  reversed,  or  departed  from, 
in  the  case  of  M.  Charles  Fourier  ?  The  fact  is,  fundamental 
changes  in  the  religious,  moral,  social,  political,  or  industrial  or- 
der of  mankind — changes  which  throw  oflf  the  old  order,  and 
establish  a  new  order  in  their  place — never  have  been,  and,  it 
requires  no  gi-eat  depth  of  philosophy  to  be  able  to  say,  never 
can  be,  eflfected,  unless  by  the  intervention  of  a  supernatural 
cause.  When  attempted,  they  may  go  so  far  as  to  break  up  the 
old  order,  never  so  far  as  to  introduce  and  establish  a  new  order. 
Man  can  be  a  destroyer  ;  he  can  never  be  a  Creator. 

But  these  considerations,  however  conclusive  in  themselves, 
will  not,  we  are  aware,  have  much  weight  with  the  Association- 
ists. The  Associationists  are  accustomed  to  other  principles  of 
reasoning ;  they  have,  underlying  their  speculations,  a  philoso- 
phy of  man  and  society  which  creates  in  their  minds  a  presump- 
tion in  favor  of  Fourierism.  With  them,  it  is  an  argument  in 
favor  of  a  proposition,  that  it  is  novel ;  and  an  argument  against 
it,  that  it  is  ancient.  Nothing  seems  to  them  more  reasonable 
beforehand,  or  more  in  accordance  wnth  what  the  order  of  hu- 
man experience  authorizes  them  to  expect,  than  that  such  a 
discovery  as  Fourier's  should  be  made,  and  that  the  changes  he 
proposes  should  be  practicable.  It  is  useless,  so  far  as  they  are 
concerned,  to  controvert  them  on  this  point, — and  if  we  would 


448  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION 

reach  them,  with  the  hope  of  doing  them  any  good,  we  must 
enter  with  them  into  an  examination  of  their  doctrine  or  scheme, 
upon  its  merits.  This  we  wilhngly  attempt ;  for  several  of  the 
more  distinguished  Associationists  in  this  country  have  been  our 
intimate  personal  friends,  and  we  regard  them  as  sincere,  and  as 
honestly  desirous  of  doing  all  in  their  power  for  the  benefit  of 
their  fellow-men.  We  beheve  they  are  men  who  have  a  certain 
loyalty ;  and  who  have  no  bigoted  attachment  to  this  or  that 
method  of  serving  mankind,  but  are  willing  to  change  the 
method  they  now  insist  upon  for  another,  the  moment  they  see 
a  good  reason  for  doing  so.  We  do  not  believe  them  unwilling 
to  look  upon  the  question  as  still  an  open  question,  or  that  they 
have  much  of  that  foolish  pride  which  binds  persons  to  a  cause 
simply  for  the  reason  that  they  stand  committed  to  it  before  the 
public.  We  propose,  therefore,  in  what  follows,  to  enter  some- 
what into  the  merits  of  their  doctrine  and  schemes  ;  and,  as 
Avhat  we  shall  say  is  said  in  good  faith,  we  trust  they  will  receive 
it  in  good  faith,  and  frankly  accept  it,  or  show  us  good  reasons 
for  rejecting  it. 

We  begin  by  asking,  What  is  the  end  the  Associationists 
propose,  or  what  is  it  they  seek  to  effect  ?  The  means  we 
understand  very  well ;  they  are,  the  organization  of  labor  and 
association,  according  to  a  given  plan.  But  before  we  can  de- 
cide on  the  means,  we  must  understand  the  end  proposed,  so  as 
to  be  able  to  determine  whether  the  end  is  desirable,  a  good  end. 
After  that,  we  may  proceed  to  determine  whether  the  means  are 
adequate,  whether  by  adopting  them  we  can,  in  all  reasonable 
probability,  secure  the  end.  Unless  we  know  what  is  the  end 
proposed,  and  know  whether  it  be  good  or  not  good,  we  walk  by 
conjecture,  not  by  science.  But  the  Associationists  propose  their 
doctrine,  not  as  a  theory,  or  as  a  system  of  belief,  but  as  a  sci- 
ence. They  must,  then,  in  the  outset,  show  us  clearly  the  end 
proposed,  and  establish,  not  conjectu rally,  not  hypothetically,  but 
scientijically^  that  the  end  is  good,  and  therefore,  one  which  it  is 
lawful  to  seek. 

1.  AVhat,  then,  is  the  specific  end  they  propose?     We  do  not 


LABOR   AND    ASSOCIATION.  449 

find  in  their  writings  as  clear,  distinct,  and  specific  an  answer  to 
this  question  as  is  desirable.  They  answer  generally,  not  speci- 
fically. Their  answer,  as  we  collect  it,  is, — "  The  end  we  pro- 
pose is,  to  remove  the  obstacles  which  now  hinder  the  fulfilment, 
and  to  gather  round  man  the  circumstances  which  will  enable 
him  to  fulfil,  his  destiny  on  this  globe ;  or,  in  a  word,  to  enable 
man  to  fiilfil  the  purpose  of  his  present  existence."  Thus  stated 
we  of  course  have  no  objection  to  the  end  proposed.  The  good 
of  a  being  is  its  destiny,  or  the  end  for  which  it  exists  ;  and  to 
seek  to  enable  a  being  to  fulfil  its  destiny,  or  gain  that  end,  is  to 
seek  its  good.  So  the  end  for  which  man  exists  in  this  world  is 
his  good  in  relation  to  his  existence  here  ;  and  to  labor  to  enable 
him  to  gain  that  end  is  to  labor  for  his  good,  and  his  only  good 
here.  Thus  far,  we  have,  and  can  have,  no  quarrel  with  the 
Associationists. 

But  a  general  answer  to  a  specific  question  is  no  answer  at 
all ;  for  the  general  has  formal  existence  only  in  the  special. 
We  must,  therefore,  ask  again.  What  is  the  specific  end  pro- 
posed ?  To  answer,  To  remove  evil,  and  to  secure  good,  is  not 
enough  ;  for  the  question  remains.  What  is  evil  ?  what  is  good  ? 
Evil,  you  say,  is  that  which  prevents,  or  in  some  way  hinders  or 
retards,  the  fulfilment  of  one's  destiny.  Very  true  ;  but  what  is 
it  that  does  that  ?  This  is  the  question  we  want  answered.  We 
find  in  the  writings  of  the  Associationists  graphic  descriptions  of 
the  actual  state  of  society, — what  they  call  Civilization, — and 
brilliant  pictures  of  the  life  men  will  live  in  Harmony,  or  the 
new  world  they  propose ;  and  it  is  from  these  we  must  collect 
what,  in  their  view,  is  evil,  or  opposed  to  man's  destiny  on  this 
globe,  and  what  they  suppose  is  good,  that  is,  its  fulfilment,  or 
ftivorable  to  its  fulfilment.  In  regard  to  the  latter,  we  find  the 
chief  place  assigned  to  wealth  and  luxury,  two  things  which 
Fourier  asserts  possitively,  again  and  again,  are  absolutely  indis- 
pensable to  the  fulfilment  of  our  destiny  ;  in  regard  to  the 
former,  we  find  enumerated,  among  the  evils  of  civilization,  the 
povertij  of  the  great  mass  of  the  people,  and  unattractive  labor. 
It  is  fair,  then,  to  say,  that  poverty  and  unattractive  labor  are  evils, 


450  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

in  the  judgment  of  the  Associatioiiists.  Labor  itself  they  can- 
not regard  as  evil,  because  they  propose  to  continue  it  in  their 
new  world.  The  evil,  then,  is  in  its  unattractiveness, — that  is, 
in  our  being  bound  or  forced  to  labor  against  our  inclinations, 
or  to  do  that  to  which  we  are  more  or  less  averse.  But  this 
can  be  evil  only  on  condition  that  it  is  an  evil  to  be  under  the 
necessity  of  acting  against  our  inclinations.  If  this  be  accepted, 
good  is  in  being  free  to  follow  our  inclinations  ;  evil  in  being 
compelled  or  bound  to  act  against  them.  On  what  authority 
does  this  principle  rest? 

Moreover,  is  it  certain  that  poverty,  in  itself  considered,  is 
evil,  or  opposed  to  our  destiny  ?  Where  is  the  proof?  Wealth 
and  poverty  are  both  relative  terms,  unless  the  term  poverty  be 
restricted  to  those  who  have  not  even  so  much  as  their  will  which 
is  their  own,  and  then  we  should  be  obliged  to  predicate  wealth 
of  ail  who  possess  something,  however  little.  But  the  Associa- 
tionists  do  not  so  restrict  the  sense  of  the  word,  for  they  include, 
in  the  number  of  the  poor,  people  who  have  something  of  their 
own,  at  least  their  will  and  bodily  activity.  What,  then,  is  the 
real  distinction  between  wealth  and  poverty  ?  Where  draw  the 
line,  so  that  the  rich  shall  all  be  on  one  side,  and  all  the  poor  on 
the  other  ?  John  Jacob  Astor  is  said,  when  told  of  a  man  who 
had  just  retired  from  business  with  half  a  million,  to  have  re- 
marked, that  he  had  no  doubt  but  the  poor  man  might  be  just 
as  happ}''  as  if  he  were  rich  !  To  John  Jacob  Astor,  the  man 
worth  half  a  milhon  was  a  poor  man  ;  to  most  men,  he  would 
be  a  rich  man.  One  man  counts  himself  poor,  in  the  po'^ses- 
sion  of  thousands ;  another  feels  himself  rich,  if  he  have  a 
coarse  serge  robe,  a  crust  of  bread,  and  water  from  the  spring. 
Which  of  the  two  is  the  rich,  which  tJie  poor  man  ?  If  the 
Italian  lazzaroni,  the  scandal  of  thrifty  Englishmen  and  Yankees, 
have  what  contents  them,  or  are  contented  with  what  suffices 
for  the  present  moment,  unsolicitous  for  the  next,  wherein  are 
they  poorer  than  our  "  merchant  princes,"  who  have  a  multitude 
of  wants  they  cannot  satisfy  ?  and  wherein  would  you  enrich 


LABOR   AND    ASSOCIATION.  451 

them,  by  increasing  tlieir  possessions,  if  you  increased  their 
■wants  in  the  same  ratio  ? 

But  pass  over  this  difficulty.  Suppose  you  have  some  inva- 
riable standard  by  which  to  determine  who  are  the  poor  and 
who  are  the  rich  ;  whence  does  it  follow  that  poverty  is  in  itself 
an  evil  ?  Many  emperors,  kings,  princes,  nobles,  and  innumera- 
ble saints,  have  voluntarily  abandoned  wealth,  and  chosen  pov- 
erty, even  made  a  solemn  vow  never  to  have  any  thing  to  call 
their  own.  Is  it  certain  that  these  have  acted  a  foolish  part, 
abandoned  good,  and  inflicted  evil  on  themselves  ?  If  not,  how 
can  you  say  poverty  is  in  itself  an  evil  ?  Do  you  say,  poverty 
breeds  discontent,  and  leads  to  vice  and  crime  ?  Is  that  true  ? 
Does  it  do  so  in  all  men  who  are  poor  ?  Did  it  do  so  in  St. 
Anthony,  St.  Francis  of  Assisium,  St.  John  of  God,  St.  Thomas 
of  Villanova,  St.  Philip  Neri,  and  thousands  of  others  we  could 
mention,  who  observed  evangelical  poverty  to  the  letter  ?  Ai-e 
all  the  poor  discontented,  vicious,  and  criminal  ?  No  man  dares 
say  it.  Then  what  you  allege  is  not  a  necessary  result  of  pov- 
erty, and  must  have  its  efficient  cause  elsewhere,  in  the  person, 
or  in  some  circumstance  not  dependent  on  wealth  or  poverty. 
In  the  world's  history,  povery,  vice,  and  misery  are  far  from  being 
inseparable  companions  ;  and  so  are  wealth,  virtue,  and  happiness. 
Was  wealth  a  good  to  the  rich  man  mentioned  in  the  Gospel  ? 
Was  poverty  an  evil  to  the  poor  man  that  lay  at  his  gate  fall  of 
sores,  begging  to  be  fed  with  the  crumbs  that  fell  from  his  table  ? 

We  might  go  through  the  whole  list  of  physical  evils  drawn 
up  by  the  Associationists,  and  ask,  in  relation  to  each,  so  far  as 
it  is  physical,  the  same  or  similar  questions.  Whence,  then,  the 
certainty  that  what  they  propose  to  remove,  as  evil,  is  evil  ? 
Whence,  then,  the  proof  that  the  end  they  propose  is  a  good 
end?  Suppose — and  the  case  is  supposable — that  what  are 
called  physical  evils  are  dispensed  by  a  merciful  Providence, 
designed  to  be  invaluable  blessings,  and  are  such  to  all  who  re- 
ceive and  bear  them  with  the  proper  dispositions  ;  could  we  then 
pronounce  them  evils  ?  Would  it  not  follow,  that  in  themselves 
they  may  be  indifferent,  and  that  the  good  or  the  evil  results 


452  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

from  the  disposition  with  which  they  are  received  and  borne  ? 
Now  this  may  be  the  fact.  If  it  is,  then  the  good  or  the  evil 
depends  on  ourselves,  and  we  may  make  them  either  blessings 
or  curses,  as  we  choose.  Then  to  remove  evil  would  not  neces- 
sarily be  to  remove  them,  but  to  cure  that  moral  state  which 
makes  a  bad,  instead  of  a  good,  use  of  them. 

It  is  easy  to  declaim,  but  it  is  important  that  we  declaim 
wisely ;  and  to  be  able  to  declaim  wisely,  we  must  know  what 
to  declaim  against.  It  is  easy  to  harrow  up  the  feelings  by  elo- 
quent descriptions  of  physical  sufferings,  and  no  doubt  physical 
sufferings  are  often  an  evil  of  no  small  magnitude ;  but  this  is 
nothing  to  the  purpose.  Is  the  evil  in  the  physical  suffering  it- 
self, or  in  the  moral  state  of  him  who  causes  or  suffers  it  ?  Sup- 
pose we  transport  ourselves  to  the  early  ages  of  our  era,  and 
take  our  stand  in  proud,  haughty,  imperial,  and  pagan  Rome ; 
suppose  we  assist  at  the  trial,  tortures,  and  martyrdom  of  the 
persecuted  Christians,  behold  them  cast  to  the  wild  beasts  in  the 
amphitheatre,  see  them  broiling  slowly  on  gridirons,  their  flesh 
torn  off  with  pincers,  or  their  living  bodies  stuck  full  of  splinters 
besmeared  with  pitch,  lighted,  and  ranged  along  the  streets  of 
the  city  by  night,  as  so  many  lamps.  Here  is  physical  pain. 
Ingeimity,  aided  by  diabolical  malice,  has  done  its  best  to  refine 
upon  torture,  to  produce  the  greatest  amount  possible  of  physi- 
cal suffering.  Yet  what  is  it  that  excites  our  horror?  This 
pain  beyond  conception  of  the  Christian  martyrs  ?  Not  at  all. 
We  glory  in  it ;  we  bless  God  for  it ;  and  so  do  the  sufferers 
themselves.  They  choose  it,  voluntarily  submit  to  it,  and  joy  in 
the  midst  of  it,  and  would  not  have  it  less  for  all  the  world. 
There  is  no  joy  on  earth  so  sweet,  so  great,  so  ecstatic,  as  that 
of  the  martyr.  The  horror  we  feel  is  not  at  the  physical  suffer- 
ing, but  at  the  malice  which  inflicts  it, — not  at  the  fact  that  the 
martyrs  are  enabled  heroically  to  win  their  crowns,  but  at  the 
refined  cruelty  which  delights  to  torture  them.  It  is  very  pos- 
sible, then,  to  conceive  the  most  exquisite  physical  sufferings, 
the  most  excruciating  tortures,  and  the  most  cruel  death,  as 
even  a  great  and  invaluable  good  to  those  who  suffer  them. 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  453 

Their  presence,  then,  is  not  necessarily  an  evil  to  the  sufferer, 
and  consequently  exemption  from  them  not  necessarily  a  good. 
For  the  same  reason,  it  does  not  necessarily  follow  that  the 
wealth,  and  luxury,  and  other  things  you  propose,  are  necessa- 
rily in  themselves  at  all  desirable.  You  must  go  farther ;  and 
before  attempting  to  decide  what  is  good  or  what  is  evil,  tell  us 
WHAT  IS  THE  DESTINY  OF  MAN  *,  for  it  is  ouly  in  relation  to  his 
destiny,  that  we  can  pronounce  this  or  that  good  or  evil.  "  Am 
I  not  a  happy  man  ; "  said  Croesus  to  Solon,  after  showing  him 
his  treasures.  "  Whether  a  man  is  happy  or  not,"  replied  the 
Athenian  sao-e,  "  is  not  to  be  known  before  his  death." 

What,  then,  according  to  the  Associationists,  is  the  destiny  of 
man,  his  final  cause,  or  the  end  for  which  he  exists  ?  They 
have  much  to  say  of  man's  destiny ;  but  we  do  not  find,  in 
those  of  their  writings  which  we  have  consulted,  any  very  satis- 
factory or  even  intelligible  answer  to  this  question.  We  are 
told,  at  one  time,  that  man's  destiny  is,  to  live  in  harmony, — 
that  is,  in  association  as  they  propose  to  organize  it.  But  this 
is  no  answer ;  for  it  only  asserts,  in  other  words,  that  man  is 
able  or  fitted  by  nature  to  adopt  the  means  of  fulfilling  his  des- 
tiny. Besides,  it  defines  the  destiny  of  the  race  rather  than  the 
destiny  of  the  individuals,  without  which  the  race  is  only  an 
abstraction.  At  other  times,  we  are  told  that  man's  destiny  is, 
to  harmonize  the  globe  which  he  inhabits  with  itself,  to  har- 
monize it  with  the  sideral  heavens,  and  the  sideral  heavens  with 
the  universe  so  that  all  discord  shall  cease,  and  there  shall  be 
universal  harmony ;  that  is,  man's  destiny  is,  to  complete  the 
works  of  the  Creator,  and  give  them  their  last  finish !  The 
final  cause  of  man  is,  then,  to  assist  the  Creator  in  completing 
the  work  of  creation,  that  is,  that  he  may  constitute  a  portion 
of  the  First  Cause !  This,  however,  we  understand  to  be  only 
a  fanciful  speculation,  for  which  the  school,  as  it  exists  in  this 
country,  does  not  hold  itself  responsible. 

The  more  modest  of  the  members  leave  these  lofty  specula- 
tions by  the  way,  and  tell  us  that  their  object,  and  their  sole  ob- 
ject is,  by  the  organization  of  labor  and  association,  to  enable 


454  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

man  to  fulfil  his  destiny  on  earth.  But  what  is  this  destiny  ? 
We  can  find  no  specific  answer.  But  they  lay  down,  as  their 
grand  principle,  Attractions  proportional  to  destiny.  Ac- 
cording to  them,  we  may,  therefore,  conclude  man's  destiny  in 
this  world  is  that  towards  which  he  is  attracted  by  his  nature,  or 
which  is  indicated  by  his  natural  inclinations  and  tendencies.  If 
we  understand  them,  they  undertake  to  give  the  law  of  attain- 
ing our  destiny,  rather  than  any  clear  statement  of  what  is  that 
destiny  itself  But  as  the  attractions  are  natural,  and  as  they 
are  the  index  to  the  end,  and  the  law  of  its  attainment,  the  end 
must  itself  be  natural.  If,  then,  we  assert  that  they  hold,  that, 
when  man  has  developed  and  satisfied  in  harmony  his  primitive 
or  fundamental  passions,  or  stimulants,  as  M.  Briancourt  calls 
them,  he  has  fulfilled  his  destiny  in  this  world,  we  may  presume 
that  they  will  readly  admit  our  assertion  to  be  correct.  Then 
the  destiny  of  man  in  this  world  is,  the  harmonious  or  orderly 
development  and  satisfaction  of  his  whole  nature.  We  will 
strike  out  from  this  "  the  development  of  his  nature,"  because 
development  can  never  be  an  end,  since,  by  its  nature,  it  is  nec- 
essarily only  the  means  or  process  of  gaining  tho  end.  Then 
the  answer  will  be,  simply,  Man's  destiny  on  earth  is,  to  satisfy 
his  nature ;  that  is,  to  obtain  and  possess,  in  all  their  variety  and 
fulness,  the  natural  objects  indicated  by  his  nature,  and  towards 
which  he  is  naturally  stimulated.  This  is  nothing  but  our  old 
acquaintance,  the  Epicurean  philosophy,  decked  out  in  the  latest 
Parisian  mode.  W^e  can  now  east  ourselves,  and  take  a  fresh 
departure. 

But,  to  be  just  to  the  Associationists,  we  must  observe,  that 
they  understand  by  nature,  not  merely  our  sensual  inclinations 
and  tendencies,  but  also  our  intellectual,  social,  domestic,  and 
aesthetic  passions  or  tendencies.  Moreover,  they  do  not  teach, 
that,  in  gaining  the  end  to  which  we  are  attracted,  we  are  to 
follow  blindly  our  natural  inclinations  and  tendencies,  or  that  we 
are  necessitated  by  them.  They  are  the  index  and  the  law,  and 
we  have  reason  and  free  will,  as  instruments  by  which  to  follow 
the  law  and  secure  the  end.     Nor  do  they  teach  that  it  will  do 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  455 

to  follow  without  restraint  all  our  inclinations  and  tendencies  as 
they  are  actually  developed  under  Civilization ;  for  they  are 
DOW  developed  disproportionately,  in  violation  of  harmony,  and 
it  may  require  several  generations  in  association  before  it  will  do 
to  give  them  all  their  full  liberty ;  nevertheless,  the  end  is  in  the 
natural  order,  and  is  the  orderly  satisfaction  of  nature  by  natural 
objects. 

,  But  on  what  authority  rests  this  assumption,  that  our  destiny 
as  human  beings  in  this  world  is  the  natural  satisfaction  of  our 
nature  ?  We  do  not  find  this  proved  in  any  of  the  writings  of 
the  Associationists  which  have  fallen  under  our  notice.  M. 
Briancourt  asserts  it,  in  asserting  the  central  principle  of  the 
school, — "  Attractions  proportional  to  destiny ; "  and  he  no 
doubt  supposes  that  he  proves  it,  in  proving  this  principle,  the 
grand  discovery  of  Fourier ;  but  we  do  not  find  that  this  princi- 
ple itself  is  proved,  at  least,  in  the  case  of  human  beings,  the 
only  order  of  beings  concerned  in  the  inquiry.  The  school 
may  have  proved  it  of  minerals,  vegetables,  and  the  dififerent 
orders  of  the  animal  kingdom  ;  but  that  is  nothing  to  their  pur- 
pose ;  for  we  cannot  conclude  the  attributes  and  destiny  of 
one  genus  from  those  of  another.  Because  this  or  that  is  true 
of  a  pig,  for  instance,  we  cannot  say,  it  is  therefore  true  of  man ; 
nor  that  the  fact  that  it  is  true  of  the  pig  aflfords  even  a  pre- 
sumption that  it  is  true  of  man ;  for  man  is  essentially  different 
from  the  pig.  To  say,  because  it  is  true  of  other  genera,  that 
attractions  are  proportional  to  destiny,  it  must  be  true  of  human 
beings,  is  either  a  plain  non-sequitur,  or  the  denial  that  there  is 
any  essential  difference  between  man  and  them.  If  there  is  no 
essential  difference  between  man  and  a  mineral,  a  vegetable,  a 
pig,  we  concede  your  conclusion  ;  if  there  is,  we  deny  it.  But 
tlie  former  we  are  loath  to  admit ;  and  although  our  modern 
philosophers  have  done  their  best  towards  making  it  at  least 
practically  true,  we  must  as  yet  hold  on  to  the  old  doctrine  that 
man  is  generically  distinguished  from  all  other  orders  of  crea- 
tures, although'  he  may  have  many  attributes  in  common  with 
them  all. 


456  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

If,  as  we  presume  it  will  be  conceded,  man  is  essentially  dis- 
tinguishable from  the  animal  world,  if  he  forms  a  genus  of  his 
own,  nothing  can  be  concluded  of  him,  in  so  for  as  he  is  pecu- 
liarly man,  from  any  other  order;  consequently,  whatever  is 
affirmed  of  him  must  be  specifically  proved  of  him.  It  may 
be,  that  all  other  orders  of  creatures  on  this  globe  have  a  natu- 
ral destiny,  and  yet  the  Creator  have  appointed  him  to  a  super- 
natural destiny.  It  may  be,  as  the  Church  teaches,  and  the 
Christian  believes,  that  the  end  for  which  God  designed  and 
made  him  is  not  that  to  which  he  is  directed  and  drawn  by  his 
nature,  even  in  its  purity  and  integrity,  but  an  end  to  which, 
since  the  foil,  his  nature  is  even  averse,  and  which  can  be  liniiu^l 
only  by  denying  and  crucifying  his  natural  inclinations  and  tend- 
encies. This  maybe, — that  is,  it  is  conceivable  ;  and  if  true,  it 
will  not  do  to  say,  a  iinor'i.,  of  man,  that  attractions  are  propor- 
tional to  destiny,  or  that  they  at  all  indicate  either  it  or  the  law 
of  its  attainment.  Now  it  is  possible  that  this  constitutes,  in  part, 
the  essential  diflerence  between  man  and  animals.  If  so,  the 
whole  doctrine  of  the  Associationists  falls  to  the  ground. 

The  Associationists  must  not  misapprehend  the  question  we 
raise.  We  are  travelling  no  more  than  they  out  of  life  in  this 
world.  We  understand  them  to  confine  their  view  to  man's 
destiny  here  on  this  globe ;  we  are  not,  at  this  moment,  extend- 
ing ours  beyond  it.  We  agree  perfectly  with  them,  in  what  we 
presume  to  be  their  principle,  namely,  that  there  is  no  contradic- 
tion between  our  destiny  here  and  our  destiny  hereafter,  and 
that  the  surest  method  of  gaining  our  end  in  the  world  to  come 
is  faithfully  to  fulfil  our  destiny  in  the  world  where  we  now  are. 
We  raise  no  question  between  our  present  good  and  our  future 
good ;  for  we  suppose  the  principle  of  both  to  be  the  same. 
Nor  do  we  raise  a  question  as  to  foregoing  our  good  in  this  life, 
for  the  sake  of  gaining  a  good  hereafter ;  for  we  have  never 
been  taught  that  our  true  good  here  is  at  all  incompatible  with 
beautitude  in  heaven.  The  Christian  who  denies  himself,  chas- 
tises, mortifies  the  flesh  with  its  deeds,  crucifies  his  natural  in- 
clinations, is  not  supposed  to  deprive  himself  of  any  good  here, 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  45*7 

and  he  perhaps  enjoys,  even  in  this  life,  a  hundred-fold  more 
than  the  Association ists  in  their  most  brilliant  and  ravishino- 
day-dreams  even  venture  to  promise.  We  suspect  that  the  life 
they  promise  would  have  had  very  few  attractions  for  St.  Francis 
of  Assisium,  St.  Anthony,  St.  Benedict,  or  St.  Bernard,  even  as 
to  this  world.  The  question  lies  between  the  life  of  nature,  as 
contended  for  by  the  Associationists,  and  the  supernatural  life^ 
which  the  Christian  professes  to  hve.  The  Christian  lives  his 
supernatural  life  even  in  this  world,  and  its  enjoyment  is  an  en- 
joyment here,  as  well  as  hereafter.  Both  lives  may  therefore  be 
considered  as  lived  on  this  globe,  yet  differing  as  to  their  princi- 
ple and  end.  The  Christian  view  is,  that  God  made  man, 
whether  you  speak  of  this  world  or  of  that  which  is  to  come, 
for  a  supernatural  destiny ;  the  Associationist  view  is,  that  man 
is  made,  at  least  so  far  as  this  world  is  concerned,  for  a  natural 
destiny.  The  question  is  between  the  two.  If  the  Christian  is 
right,  the  Associationist  is  wrong,  and  his  effort  to  provide  for 
the  gaining  of  a  natural  destiny,  for  a  life  in  accordance  with 
natural  inclination  and  tendency,  is  directly  at  war  with  man's 
true  destiny  on  this  globe,  and  therefore  with  man's  true  good, 
not  only  his  true  good  hereafter,  but  his  true  good  here. 

The  Associationists,  of  course,  do  not  believe  the  Church; 
but  that  is  not  the  question.  They  profess  to  walk  by  sight,  by 
science,  and  therefore  they  must  demonstrate  that  she  is  wrong, 
or  have  no  right  to  assert  as  science  their  doctrine,  that  man's 
destiny  on  this  globe  is  a  natural  destiny,  or  that  the  end  of  our 
existence  here  is  attained  by  living  a  natural  hfe.  But  they 
have  not  demonstrated  this  ;  they  have,  at  best,  only  proved 
that  this  is  or  may  be  true  of  various  animal  tribes ;  but  they, 
have  not  proved  at  all  that  it  is  true  of  man.  At  best,  then, 
their  doctrine  is  but  an  hypothesis,  a  belief,  for  which  they  do 
not,  and  cannot,  even  pretend  to  have  infallible  authority. 

The  Associationists  tell  us  that  they  have  proved  their  doc- 
trine by  analysis  of  human  nature,  and  that  therefore  it  is  sci- 
ence. But  proved  what  ?  Conceding  them  all  they  can  pre- 
tend to  have  proved  by  analysis,  it  is  only  that  the  primitive 


458  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

passions  or  stimulants  they  assert  are  psychologically  true, — 
from  which,  at  best,  they  can  conclude  only  what  would  he 
man's  destiny,  in  case  his  destiny  were  natural ;  but  that  it  is 
natural,  the  precise  point  to  be  proved,  they  have  not  proved, 
for  it  can  never  be  concluded  from  nature.  Nature  can  guide 
us  only  on  the  assumption  that  the  end  is  natural.  When  the 
question  comes  up.  Is  the  purpose  of  our  existence  natural,  or 
supernatural  ?  nature  has  nothing  to  say  one  way  or  the  other. 
This  is  a  question  which  science  can  never  answer ;  for  science 
can  never  travel  out  of  nature.  It  is  idle,  then,  for  the  Associa- 
tionists  to  tell  us  their  doctrine  is  scientifically  established. 
Whether  the  end  for  which  Almighty  God  placed  us  here  is 
natural  or  supernatural  it  is  impossible  to  know  without  a  super- 
natural revehition,  and  to  a  supernatural  revelation,  declaring 
our  destiny  here  to  be  natural,  the  Associationists  do  not  pre- 
tend. 

These  remarks  show  clearly  enough  that  the  Associationists 
are  unable  to  answer  the  first  question  in  order,  namely,  What 
is  man's  destiny  on  this  globe  ?  Then  they  are  unable  to  legiti- 
mate the  end  they  ]:)ropose ;  then  unable  to  say,  that  what  they 
call  good  is  good,  or  what  they  call  evil  is  evil ;  and  then,  final- 
ly, whether,  even  by  comj)lete  success,  they  would  or  would  not 
benefit  their  fellow-men.  This  deserves  their  serious  considera- 
tion. If,  as  we  have  said,  what  the  Church  teaches  and  the 
Christian  believes  is  true,  they  are  certainly  wrong  as  to  man's 
destiny  here,  as  well  as  hereafter.  It  will  not  do  for  them  to 
reply,  that  they  do  not  believe  the  Church,  and  that  her  author- 
ity is  not  sufficiently  proved  to  them;  because  they  must  be 
able  to  assert  their  system  as  a  science,  or  they  have  no  right  to 
assert  it  at  all.  They  must,  then,  disprove  the  teaching  of  the 
Church.  So  long  as  there  is  a  possibility  that  the  teaching  of 
the  Church  may  turn  out  to  be  true,  they  cannot  assert  their 
own  doctrine ;  for,  in  the  nature  of  the  case,  they  can  conclude 
its  truth  only  from  the  distruction  of  the  negative. 

2.  This  uncertainty  as  to  man's  destiny  here,  which  the  Asso- 
ciationists do  not  and  cannot  remove,  attaches  of  course,  to  the 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  459 

means  proposed  to  enable  us  to  fulfil  it.  The  school  adopts,  as 
we  have  seen,  as  its  fundamental  principle,  "  Attractions  propor- 
tional to  destin}-."  Hence,  by  ascertaining  and  providing  for 
the  attractions,  they  determine  and  provide  for  the  destiny.  On 
this  principle  rests  their  whole  fabric  of  Association.  If  this  be 
true,  their  Association  may  or  may  not  be  adequate ;  but  if  not 
true,  the  whole  scheme  is  evidently  altogether  inadequate,  be- 
cause natural  attractions  can  be  proportional  only  to  a  natural 
end,  never  to  a  supernatural  end.  This  is  conclusive  against  the 
scheme,  till  its  advocates  are  able,  by  a  supernatural  authority, 
to  prove  that  our  destiny  in  this  world  is  a  natural  destiny ;  for 
it  requires  no  argument  to  prove  that  Association,  organized 
with  express  reference  to  a  natural  destiny,  must  be  unavaihng 
— if  nothing  worse — for  a  supernatural  destiny. 

But  even  if  the  end  of  man  in  this  world  were  the  satisfaction 
of  his  nature,  the  means  proposed  would  be  inadequate.  The  as- 
sumption of  the  Association  is  ts  is,  that  our  nature  can  be  satis- 
fied by  the  possession  of  the  natural  objects  to  which  it  directs 
and  draws  us.  But  this  is  not  true.  The  arguments  on  which 
the  Associationists  rely  to  prove  the  contrary  are  inconclusive, 
because  they  are  all  arguments  from  one  genus  to  another. 
When  the  premises  and  conclusion  are  not  in  the  same  genus, 
nothing  is  concluded.  It  may  be  true,  as  M.  Briancourt  proves, 
that,  if  a  pig  gets  what  his  nature  seeks,  he  will  be  satisfied, 
stop  squealing,  and  he  down  and  sleep,  till  renewed  appetite 
awakes  him ;  and  the  same  would,  no  doubt,  be  true  of  man,  if, 
man  w^ere  a  pig,  and  might  become  true  of  him,  if  he  by  some 
Circean  art,  could  be  transformed  into  a  pig.  But  it  so  happens 
that  man  is  not  a  pig,  and  cannot,  if  he  is  to  retain  his  essential 
nature  as  man,  be  changed  into  one.  We  cannot  predicate  in- 
ditferently  of  the  two.  Man  is  never  satisfied  by  the  possession 
of  the  natural  objects  to  which  he  is  naturally  drawn.  All  ex- 
perience proves  it ;  the  experience  of  each  particular  man  proves 
it ;  else  wherefore  this  deep  wail  from  the  heart  of  every  one 
who  lives  simply  the  life  of  nature,  this  outbreak  of  despair, 
Vanitas  vanitatum.  et  omnia  vanitas  ?     Build  man  the  most 


460  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

splendid  palace;  lavish  on  it  all  the  decorations  of  the  iTOst 
perfect  art ;  furnish  it  with  the  most  exquisite  and  most  expen- 
sive taste ;  lodge  him  in  it  on  the  soft,  voluptuous  couch  ;  spread 
his  table  with  the  most  delicate  viands  and  the  rarest  fruits ;  re- 
fresh him  with  the  most  costly  wines;  regale  him  with  the 
richest  music ;  rain  down  upon  him  the  most  fragrant  odoi's ; 
ravish  him  with  beauty ;  gratify  every  sense,  every  taste,  every 
wish,  as  soon  as  formed ;  and  the  poor  wretch  will  sigh  for  he 
knows  not  what,  and  behold  with  envy  even  the  ragged  beggar 
feeding  on  offal.  No  variety,  no  change,  no  art,  can  satisfy  liim. 
All  that  nature  or  art  can  offer  palls  upon  his  senses  and  his 
heart, — is  to  him  poor,  mean,  and  despicable.  There  arise  in 
him  wants  which  are  too  vast  for  nature,  which  swell  out  beyond 
the  bounds  of  the  universe,  and  cannot,  and  will  not,  be  satis- 
fied with  any  thing  less  than  the  infinite  and  eternal  God. 
Never  yet  did  nature  suffice  for  man,  and  it  never  will. 

This  great  and  solemn  fact,  which  it  is  vain  to  attempt  to 
deny, — a  fiict  deep  graven  on  all  hearts  that  have  experience, 
that  have  lived  the  natural  life, — should  lead  thoughtful  men 
to  ask, — nay,  it  does  lead  thoughtful  men  to  ask, — if,  after  all, 
it  be  not  a  mistake  to  attempt  to  satisfy  ourselves  with  the 
vain  and  perishing  things  of  this  world  ;  if  the  inability  to  find 
our  satisfaction  in  nature  be  not  a  strong  presumption  that  our 
Creator  did  not  design  us  for  a  natural  destiny ;  if,  in  foct,  he 
did  not  intend  us  for  an  end  above  nature ;  and  therefore,  that 
our  precise  error  is  in  seeking  a  natural  destiny  in  opposition  to 
his  design,  in  neglecting  our  true  destiny  for  a  false  destiny,  that 
is,  neglecting  true  good  and  pursuing  real  evil.  We  should 
suppose  that  this  univei*sal  experience  of  all  men  would  have 
created,  at  least,  a  doubt,  in  the  minds  of  our  friends,  as  to  the 
soundness  of  their  assumption  of  the  natural  as  the  true  destiny 
of  man  on  this  globe. 

The  Associationists,  doubtless,  will  reply,  that  they  do  not 
mean  to  deny  the  supernatural  destiny  ;  that  they  leave  to  man 
all  the  satisfactions  of  religion  ;  that  there  is  no  incompatibihty 
between  the  supernatural  life  of  the  Christian  and  the  natural 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  461 

life  of  harmony.  But  in  this  they  are  mistaken.  The  principle, 
the  means,  and  the  end  of  their  life  are  natural ;  but  the  prin- 
ciple, the  means,  and  the  end  of  the  other  are  supernatural,  and 
no  man  can  possibly  live  both  lives  at  once.  This  is  what  our 
Lord  meant,  when  he  said,  "  You  cannot  serve  God  and  mam- 
mon. No  man  can  serve  two  masters."  When  you  propose 
natui-e  as  the  end,  and  organize  Association  expressly  in  refer- 
ence to  it,  you  do  not  leave  man  free  to  propose  God  as  his  end, 
and  to  live  solely  the  supernatural  Hfe.  Moreover,  you  exclude 
religion  from  the  Association.  You  recognize  nothing  that  has 
the  least  resemblance  to  religion.  It  has  with  you  no  substan- 
tive existence ;  for,  as  M.  Briancourt  defines  it,  it  is  nothing  but 
the  reflection  in  their  harmonic  relations  of  all  the  primitive 
stimulants,  as  light,  which  is  itself  no  color,  is  the  reflection  of 
all  the  primitive  coloi-s  in  perfect  harmony. 

Furthermore,  the  Associationists  cannot  admit  the  necessity 
of  religion  without  abandoning  their  system.  Their  system  is 
founded  on  the  principle,  that  attractions  are  proportional  to 
destiny  ;  and  if  what  pertains  to  the  natural  order  is  inadequate 
to  satisfy  nature,  their  system  is  false.  The  admission  of  the 
necessity  of  any  thing  transcending  nature  as  a  principle,  a 
means,  or  an  end,  would  be  the  denial  of  the  sufficiency  of  na- 
ture ;  therefore,  that  attractions  are  proportional  to  destiny ; 
therefore,  the  denial  of  the  whole  scheme  of  Association.  The 
Associationists  are  not  at  liberty,  when  we  have  shown  them 
from  experience  that  nature  does  not  suffice  for  nature,  to  defend 
themselves  by  saying.  Then  bring  in  the  supernatural ;  for  they 
are  not  at  liberty  to  abandon  the  essential  principle  of  their 
system,  and  still  continue  to  assert  it. 

And,  finally,  if  the  system  is  insufficient  in  itself,  if  under  it, 
as  under  Civilization,  our  destiny  is  not  attainable  without  the 
supernatural,  the  system  is  useless,  for  the  supernatural  alone  is 
sufficient.  The  man  who  hves  the  supernatural  life  of  the 
Christian  has  God,  and  therefore  all.  He  despises  the  life  your 
Association  proposes.  Your  wealth  and  luxury,  your  palace  and 
grounds,  your  flower-gardens  and  ball-rooms,  your  song  and 


462  LABOR   AND    ASSOCIATION. 

dance,  3^our  statues  and  pictures,  your  scientific  reunions,  and 
your  "  Esthetic  Teas,"  are  to  liim  vanity,  yea,  less  than  vanity, 
and  nothing.  He  holds  them  in  utter  contempt,  and  tramples 
them  beneath  his  feet,  and  weeps  tears  of  pity  and  tender  com- 
passion over  those  poor  creatures  who  can  esteem  them.  The 
epicurean  and  the  saint,  though  for  different  reasons,  both  ex- 
claim of  all  the  world  can  give,  Vanitj/  of  vanities^  all  is  vanity  ! 
The  former,  because  he  has  grown  weary  of  it,  and  found  it  im- 
potent to  fill  up  the  vacuum  in  his  heart ;  the  latter,  because  he 
is  full  without  it,  because  he  has  no  need  of  it,  because  it  can 
offer  him  nothing,  and  serves  only  to  distract  him  from  God,  and 
hinder  his  divine  life. 

But  we  have  objections  to  the  adequacy  of  the  means  pro- 
posed, of  a  kind  which  will  have  more  weight  with  our  friends, 
the  Associationists.  The  means  proposed  are  intended,  besides 
other  things,  to  remove  the  evils  of  poverty,  that  is,  the  moral 
evils  occasioned  in  the  community  by  poverty  ;  for  of  the  phy- 
sical evils  we  say  nothing.  There  is  no  question  but  poverty 
occasions  discontent,  envy,  and  repining,  and  these  again  lead  to 
crimes  against  both  person  and  property.  But  it  occasions  these 
evils  only  when  it  is  contrasted  with  wealth.  There  is  no  more 
discontent,  envy,  or  repining,  where  all  are  alike  poor,  .than 
where  all  are  alike  rich.  The  hovel  is  a  hovel  only  as  contrast- 
ed with  the  palace  which  rises  by  its  side  and  overtops  it.  The 
remedy  here  is  either  internal  or  external.  The  internal  is 
moral,  religious,  which  raises  the  poor  to  the  supernatural  life, 
gives  them  all  the  most  iiivored  have  or  can  have,  and  leads 
them  to  look  upon  all  the  distinctions  of  rank  and  wealth  as  of 
no  value,  and  to  trample  the  world  beneath  their  feet.  He  who 
asks  nothing  fi-om  the  world  envies  never  those  who  possess  it, 
and  repines  never  that  he  is  poor.  This  remedy  is  the  one  the 
Church  approves,  and  labors  always  to  apply ;  and  it  checks 
alike  the  envy  and  repining  of  the  poor,  and  the  pride  and 
insolence  of  the  rich,  enabling  both  to  live  together  in  mutual 
peace  and  charity, — in  harmony.  But  this  remedy  the  Associa- 
tionists reject,  even  with  scorn.     They  propose  an  external  rem- 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  463 

edy.  But  the  external  remedy  can  be  a  remedy  only  so  far  as 
it  removes  the  occasion ;  and  to  do  that  it  must  establish  an 
equality  of  fortunes,  or  at  least,  so  arrange  matters  that  wealth 
and  povert}^  shall  never  be  in  juxtaposition,  or  seen  in  contrast. 

But  if  we  consult  the  plan  of  the  Associationists,  we  shall  see 
that  they  propose  nothing  of  the  kind.  They  recognize  proper- 
ty and  inequality  of  property  in  like  manner  as  they  are  recog- 
nized in  our  present  social  order ;  and,  what  is  still  more  to  the 
purpose,  they  bring  together  the  extremes  of  wealth  and  pover- 
ty in  the  same  phalanx,  and  lodge  them  in  the  same  phalan- 
stery, so  that  one  cannot  go  in  or  go  out,  rise  up  or  sit  down, 
without  having  the  violent  contrast  forced  upon  his  attention,  to 
exalt  his  pride  or  madden  his  envy.  That  is,  they  propose  to 
cure  the  evil  by  increasing  what  they  regard  as  its  cause ! 

It  is  of  no  avail  to  allege  that  none  in  Association  will  be 
very  poor,  that  there  will  be  none  who  cannot  by  their  own 
labor  procure  all  the  necessaries  and  chief  comforts  of  life ;  for 
the  evil  in  question  does  not  arise  from  the  consideration  that  I 
have  little^  but  that  my  neighbor  has  more.  So  long  as  in  your 
Association  one  has  more  than  another,  you  have  not  removed 
the  occasion  of  the  evil  you  deplore.  No  matter,  if  my  plain 
apartments  are  sufficient  for  my  protection,  when  only  a  little 
lathing  and  plaster  divide  them  from  the  gay  and  elegant  and 
luxuriously  furnished  apartments  of  my  neighbors ;  no  matter 
that  my  one  dish  suffices  for  my  physical  necessities,  so  long  as, 
in  the  room  next  to  mine,  my  neighbor — a  stupid  fellow,  I  may 
think,  not  half  as  good  as  I — sits  down  to  his  dinner  of  twenty 
dishes.  Sii'^ce  all  these  violent  contrasts,  all  the  distinctions  of 
wealth,  exist  in  the  Association,  and  are  perpetually  under  the 
eye,  in  the  face  and  nose,  of  every  one,  meeting  him  at  every 
turn  he  takes,  the  occasion  of  the  evils  exists  there  in  even  a 
greater  and  a  more  offensive  degree  than  it  does  in  the  present 
social  state ;  and  as  long  as  you  do  not  by  the  Association  re- 
move the  occasion,  how  can  you  say  that  by  it  you  cure  the 
evil  ?  Do  not  refer  us  to  moral  influences  which  may  be  opera- 
tive, for  that  is  to  abandon  your  system,  and  fall  back  on  that 


464  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

which  you  condemn  and  anathematize.  Your  system  is,  to  cor- 
rect the  internal  by  the  judicious  organization  of  the  external ; 
and  if  you  are  obliged  to  appeal  from  the  external  to  the  inter- 
nal, to  supply  the  defects  of  the  organization,  you  acknowledge 
what  we  are  endeavoring  to  prove,  namely,  the  inadequacy  of 
your  means. 

Again ;  the  mother  evil  of  our  present  industrial  system,  ac- 
cording to  the  Associationists,  is  competition.  Indeed,  to  read 
thc'ir  writings,  one  is  inclined  to  believe  that  they  regard  compe- 
tition in  business  as  the  cause  of  nearly  all  the  ills  that  flesh  is 
heir  to.  Their  grand  argument  for  Association  is,  that  it  will 
entirely  do  away  with  competition  and  its  attendant  evils. 
Whether  their  view  of  competition  is  correct  or  the  reverse  is 
not  now  the  question.  The  question  is.  Does  Association,  on 
their  plan,  remove  it,  or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  afford  no  mo- 
tive or  scope  for  it  ?  If  not,  their  means  are  inadequate. 
Competition  results  from  the  inequality  of  fortunes,  the  freedom 
and  the  desire  to  accumulate.  Where  these  throe  causes  coex- 
ist, competition  is  possible  and  inevitable.  Association,  then,  to 
remove  competition,  must  take  away  these  causes,  at  least  some 
one  of  them.  The  desire  to  accumulate  can  be  suppressed  by 
external  means  only  by  an  organization  in  which  wealth  can  se- 
cure, or  aid  in  securing,  to  its  possessor  no  personal  or  social 
advantage,  or  what  is  regarded  as  an  advantage  by  him  or  by 
others.  This  can  never  be  the  case  where  wealth  and  luxury 
are  held  to  be  important,  essential  to  the  fulfilment  of  one's  des- 
tiny, and  where  the  proprietor  has  the  free  use  of  his  property. 
Grant,  then,  the  desire,  and  allow  the  freedom,  to  accumulate, 
and  you  have  competition,  because  property  is  in  its  nature 
exclusive. 

Now  all  these  conditions  of  competition  must  coexist  in  As- 
sociation, because  the  Association  is  based  on  individual  and  not 
common  property.  There  is  inequality  of  property,  and  of 
course  the  distinctions  which  always  do  and  always  must  accom- 
pany it.  There  is  freedom  to  possess  and  use,  and  there  is  free- 
dom to  acquire,  to  hoard,  or  to  display.     There  are  objects  for- 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  465 

bidden  to  the  poor,  and  accessible  only  to  tlie  rich.  There  are, 
then,  all  the  motives  to  accumulate,  and  the  same  opportunity  to 
acquire  individual  property,  and  to  purchase  pleasures  or  distinc- 
tions by  it,  which  are  furnished  by  existing  economical  arrange- 
ments. What,  then,  is  to  hinder  competition  in  the  bosom  of 
the  phalanx  itself? 

But  pass  over  this,  and  consider  the  phalanx  as  a  copartner- 
ship, or  a  huge  business  firm.  There  must  be  buying  and  selling 
between  it  and  other  firms ;  for  we  do  not  understand  the  Asso- 
ciationists  to  propose  to  stop  all  exchange,  all  trade  and  com- 
merce. What,  then,  is  to  hinder  competition  between  phalanx 
and  phalanx,  any  more  than  now  between  one  business  firm  and 
another  ?  Is  competition  between  firms  less  injurious  than  be- 
tween individuals? — between  large  firms  than  between  small 
ones?  Indeed,  is  it  not  notorious  that  the  rivalry  of  large 
bodies  is  more  unprincipled,  altogether  less  scrupulous,  than 
that  of  individuals  ?  Who  needs  to  be  told  that  a  man,  shelter- 
ing himself  under  the  shield  of  a  corporation,  will  do,  without 
scruple,  what  he  would  recoil  from  doing  in  his  individual  capa- 
city ?  What,  then,  under  your  system,  is  to  prevent  perhaps 
the  most  ruinous  competition  the  world  has  ever  witnessed  ? 
Phalanx  may  seek  to  circumvent  phalanx  in  business,  and  every 
few  days  we  may  hear  the  crash  of  one  or  another,  each  bury- 
ing eighteen  hundred  or  two  thousand  people  under  its  ruins ! 
There  is  nothing  in  your  system,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  to  prevent 
this  disastrous  result.  Men  in  the  Association  have  the  same 
passions  as  out  of  it,  and  these  passions  will  operate  in  the  same 
way,  if  they  have  the  liberty  and  the  occasion. 

We  are  aware  that  the  Associationists  suppose  that  they  will 
keep  down  the  spirit  of  rivalry  by  the  various  intellectual,  social, 
domestic,  and  esthetic  influences  which  they  expect  to  be  opera- 
tive in  Association.  But  they  recognize  the  spirit  of  rivalry,  or 
competition.  Let  this  be  remembered.  True,  they  count  on 
turning  it  into  other  channels.  Thus,  by  making  shoeblacks 
the  Legion  of  Honor,  they  fancy  that  the  ambition  will  be  to 
be  shoeblacks  ;  just  as  if  the  cross  of  honor  will  not  cease  to  be 


466  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

an  object  of  ambition  the  moment  it  is  conferred  on  the  shoe- 
black !  The  cross  of  honor  is  valued  because  it  is  bestowed  as 
the  reward  of  honorable  or  heroic  deeds.  It  does  not  confer 
the  honor,  it  signalizes  it ;  and  never  will  men  become  shoe- 
blacks for  the  sake  of  it.  It  is  impossible,  by  any  artificial 
methods,  to  raise  menial  arts  to  the  rank  of  the  liberal ;  or 
menial  services  to  the  rank  of  the  heroic,  by  conferring  on  them 
the  insignia  of  the  heroic.  If  you  want  the  liberal  and  refined 
to  be  willing  to  perform  the  most  menial  and  disgusting  duties, 
you  must  propose  the  Cross  of  Christ,  not  the  Cross  of  the 
Legion  of  Honor;  the  crown  of  immortal  life,  not  the  crown 
of  laurel. 

The  Associationists,  whatever  influences  or  arrangements  they 
may  depend  upon,  must  allow  the  individual  the  dominion  of 
himself,  and  the  freedom  to  follow  the  bent  of  his  genius.  They 
must  allow  the  former,  or  they  reduce  man  to  complete  slavery, 
and  make  the  phalanx  the  grave  of  the  individual ;  and  the  lat- 
ter, or  deny  their  grand  principle  of  attractions  proportional  to 
destiny,  and  also  their  other  principle  of  attractive  labor,  since 
no  labor  or  employment  against  one's  natural  bent  is  or  can  be 
attractive.  They  do  allow  the  first,  otherwise  individual  pro- 
perty would  be  a  mockery ;  they  allow  the  second,  otherwise 
their  distribution  of  the  phalanx  into  groups  and  series  would 
be  an  absurdity.  Allow  a  man  freedom  to  follow  his  natural 
bent,  that  is,  the  passion  or  group  of  passions  which  are  natu- 
rally predominant  in  him,  and  that  passion  or  group  will  grow 
by  indulgence,  and  soon  gain  the  complete  mastery  over  all  the 
rest,  and  subordinate  them  to  itself  Besides,  the  whole  ten- 
dency of  the  Association  is  to  this  result.  Its  grand  principle 
is,  to  follow  the  natural  order  and  the  natural  attraction.  The 
harmonious  development  our  friends  speak  of  is  not  a  precisely 
similar  development  in  every  individual,  but  the  harmonious 
development  of  each  individual  in  accordance  with  his  naturally 
predominant  tendency  or  tendencies.  To  understand  it  in  any 
other  sense  would  be  to  make  them  inconsistent  with  them- 
selves.    Consequently,  whatever  influences  they  may  bring  to 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  467 

bear  on  the  individual,  they  must  tend  to  harmonize  all  in  him 
with  his  naturally  predominant  passion.  If  then,  we  suppose 
one  whose  strong  natural  tendency  is  to  acquire  property,  his 
whole  nature  will  be  subordinated  to  this  tendency,  and  he  will 
follow  it  to  the  full  extent  of  his  freedom  and  capacity.  If  we 
suppose  two  such,  we  have  competition.  ^ 

As  for  social  influences,  these,  in  a  community  which  starts 
with  the  assumption  that  wealth  and  luxury  are  absolutely  in- 
dispensable to  the  fulfilment  of  our  destiny,  will  not  be  likely 
to  check  or  discourage  the  efibrts  without  which  wealth  and 
luxury  are  not  to  be  had.  The  domestic  influences  will  be  no 
less  favorable  to  the  accumulation  of  wealth  than  now ;  for  the 
father  bequeaths  his  property  to  his  children,  and  where  there 
are  inequalities  of  fortune,  wealth  will  confer  distinction.  The 
aesthetic  influences  are  of  no  account  for  good.  All  the  world 
are  not  artists,  and  it  is  by  no  means  certain  that  every  phalanx 
will  be  a  school  of  art ;  and  if  it  should  be,  it  must  be  borne  in 
mind  that  its  art  will  be  purely  secular,  and  purely  secular  art 
leads  to  nothing  better  than  effeminacy  and  licentiousness.  It 
would,  then,  check  the  tendency  to  accumulate,  if  at  all,  only  by 
producing  no  less  an  evil  of  another  sort.  It  would  be  well  for 
modern  rhapsodists  to  recollect  that  the  artistic  epoch — we 
speak  not  of  religious  art — follows,  but  has  never  yet  been 
known  to  precede  or  accompany,  an  heroic  epoch.  It  marks  a 
decline,  and  usually  is  or  ushers  in  an  age  of  corruption.  The 
shrine  of  natural  beauty  stands  always  in  the  vestibule  of  the 
temple  of  Venus,  when  not  in  the  temple  itself.  Avarice,  again, 
is  no  unnatural  pendant  to  voluptuousness.  We  place  no  confi- 
dence, therefore,  in  your  aesthetic-  influences,  even  to  restrain 
competition, — especially,  since  wealth  will  be  needed  as  the  min- 
ister of  voluptuousness. 

It  is  unnecessaiy  to  pursue  farther  this  branch  of  the  subject. 
All  our  primitive  tendencies  are  exclusive,  and  mutually  repel- 
lant.  They  almost  always  exist  in  excess,  and  every  one  of 
them  grows  by  indulgence.  Philosophy  and  experience  alike 
testify  that  their  harmonious  action  is  never  possible,  unless  by 


468  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

their  subjection  to  reason.  But  this  subjection  is  contrary  to 
the  principles  of  the  Associationists  ;  for  they  allow  us  reason 
and  free  will,  not  to  control  our  passions  and  keep  them  in  sub- 
jection to  the  law,  but  as  their  servants  or.  instruments.  The 
passions  give  the  law ;  reason  and  free  will  provide  for  its  ful- 
filment. Consequently,  the  harmony  of  the  passions  is  impossi- 
ble, on  the  principles  of  the  Associationists ;  and  without  such 
harmony,  their  means  are  obviously  inadequate. 

3.  Whoever  reads  the  works  of  the  Associationists  must  per- 
ceive that  they  place  great  reliance  for  the  success  of  their 
scheme  on  the  mutual  love  and  good-will  of  the  members  of 
the  phalanx.  There  is  to  be  there  no  pride  of  birth,  no  haugh- 
tiness of  rank,  no  insolence  of  wealth.  Gentlemen  and  simple- 
men,  rich  and  poor,  learned  and  unlearned,  are  all  to  meet  as 
brothers  ;  and  no  bickerings,  nor  jars,  no  envyings,  no  jealousies, 
no  aversions,  rancors,  or  heartburnings,  are  ever  to  find  admit- 
tance into  the  harmonic  paradise.  No  serpent  will  ever  find  his 
way  into  the  new  garden  of  Eden.  Every  one  will  be  courte- 
ous, affable,  gentle,  affectionate,  forbearing,  and  eager  to  oblige  ; 
and  men  will  say,  "See  how  these  phalansterians  love  one 
another !  "  Undoubtedly,  without  this,  the  Association  will  be 
torn  by  internal  dissentions,  and  soon  prove  only  a  monument 
to  the  folly  of  its  foundei-s. 

But  by  what  right  do  Associationists  count  on  this  universal 
and  never-faiUng  mutual  love  and  good-will?  They  propose 
no  radical  change  and  no  supernatural  elevation  of  human  na- 
ture. Men  enter  Association  with  all  the  essential  passions,  and 
with  all  the  diversity  of  character,  taste,  and  temperament  which 
they  now  have,  and  must  exhibit  in  Association  the  same  pheno- 
mena as  out  of  it,  so  far  as  the  occasion  is  not  removed.  There 
is  no  removal  of  the  occasion ;  and  there  must  be,  as  we  have 
shown,  just  as  much  occasion  for  the  exercise  of  all  the  bitter 
and  mischievous  passions  of  our  nature  in  Association  as  in  the 
present  order  ?  Whence,  then,  is  to  come  this  anticipated  result, 
so  widely  different  from  our  present  experience?  From  the 
moral  causes  operative  there  ?      What  are  they  ?     Nay,  you 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  469 

cannot  appeal  to  moral  causes,  for  your  system  is  to  reach  and 
modify  the  moral  through  the  physical. 

But  pass  over  this.  How  is  the  degree  of  love  necessary  to 
set  the  machinery  of  Association  in  operation  to  be  obtained 
prior  to  Association  itself?  It  requires  a  greater  degree  of  love 
to  introduce  than  it  does  to  preserve  after  introduction.  If  any 
thing  is  certain  in  philosophy,  it  is  that  the  effect  cannot  exceed 
the  cause.  Hence,  universal  experience  proves  that  the  founders 
of  human  institutions  are  always  superior  to  those  who  are 
formed  under  those  institutions.  The  progress  under  human 
institutions  is  always  downwards  ;  the  purest  and  noblest  char- 
acters formed  under  them  are  the  earliest.  Man  is  always  supe- 
rior to  his  productions,  and  these  are  superior  to  their  produc- 
tions. Reverberations  grow  fainter  and  fainter  in  the  distance. 
Mark  the  difference  between  the  men  who  made  our  Revohition 
and  the  men  of  to-day.  Between  George  Washington  and 
James  K.  Polk  there  is  a  distance  ;  and  there  would  have  been 
a  greater  distance  still,  if  it  had  not  been  for  the  continued 
operation  of  causes  not  introduced  or  essentially  affected  by  our 
Revolution.  Certainly,  then,  no  more  love  can  be  in  the  Asso- 
ciation t^an  there  is  in  the  cause  introducing  Association.  Then 
the  Associationists  must  get,  under  Civilization,  without  Associa- 
tion, all  the  love  they  can  have  with  and  under  it.  But  if  we 
can  have  the  love  without  Association,  then  there  is  no  need  of 
Association ;  if  not,  Association  is  impracticable.  Here  is  a 
conclusive  argument,  not  only  against  Association,  but  against 
every  scheme  for  effecting  the  real  progress  of  man  or  society 
hj  virtue  of  a  purely  human  principle.  Proceeding  on  a  pure- 
ly human  principle,  man,  it  is  easy  to  demonstrate,  can  no  more 
be  a  reformer  than  an  institutor, — that  is,  he  can  neither  by 
way  of  reform,  nor  by  way  of  institution,  introduce  or  establish 
any  thing  superior  to  what  he  finds  existing,  or  which,  in  fact, 
does  not  fall  below  it.  His  boasted  improvements  are  such  only 
in  relation  to  the  order  he  introduces,  and  consist  solely  in  get- 
ting more  and  more  rid  of  the  contradictions  to  it  retained  at 
first  from  the  preexisting  order.     The  departure  on  a  human 


470  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

principle  from  the  existing-  order  is  always  a  step  towards  some- 
thing inferior  or  less  perfect.  Man  can  fall  from  the  civilized 
state  to  the  savage ;  he  never  rises  spontaneously  from  the 
savage  state  to  the  civilized  ;  and  for  the  very  good  reason, 
that  in  the  moral,  no  more  than  in  the  physical  world,  can  the 
stream  rise  higher  than  the  fountain. 

Moreover,  the  love  itself,  which  our  Associationists  rely  upon, 
can  never  be  adequate  to  their  purpose.  It  is,  at  best,  only  hu- 
man love,  the  natural  sentiment  of  philanthropy.  This  answers 
very  well,  when  the  work  to  be  done  is  simply  to  propose  grand 
schemes,  make  brilliant  and  eloquent  speeches,  or  when  there 
are  no  disagreeable  duties  to  be  performed,  no  violent  natural 
repugnances  to  be  overcome  ;  but  it  fails  in  the  hour  of  severe 
trial.  Your  philanthropist  starts  with  generous  impulses,  with 
a  glowing  enthusiasm ;  and  so  long  as  there  are  no  great  dis- 
couragements, no  disgusting  offices  in  his  way,  and  he  has  even 
a  small  number  of  admiring  friends  to  stimulate  his  zeal,  ap- 
plaud his  eloquence,  flatter  his  pride,  and  soothe  him  for  the 
rebuffs  he  meets  from  the  world,  he  may  keep  on  his  course, 
and  continue  his  task.  But  let  him  find  himself  entirely  alone, 
let  him  have  no  little  public  of  his  own,  which  is  all  the  world 
to  him,  let  him  be  thwarted  on  every  point,  let  him  be  obliged 
to  work  in  secret,  unseen  by  all  but  the  All-seeing  Eye,  en- 
counter from  men  nothing  but  contradiction,  contempt,  and  in- 
gratitude, and  he  will  soon  begin  to  say  to  himself,  Why  suffer 
and  endure  so  much  for  the  unworthy  ?  He  who  loves  man 
for  man's  sake  loves  only  a  creature,  a  being  of  imperfect  worth, 
of  no  more  worth  than  himself,  perhaps  not  so  much  ;  and  why 
shall  he  love  him  more  than  himself,  and  sacrifice  himself  for 
him  ?  The  highest  stretch  of  human  love  is,  to  love  our  neigh- 
bor as  we  love  ourselves;  and  we  do  injustice  to  ourselves, 
•when  we  love  them  more  than  we  do  ourselves. 

Nay,  philanthropy  itself  is  a  sort  of  selfishness.  It  is  a  senti- 
ment, not  a  principle.  Its  real  motive  is  not  another's  good, 
but  its  own  satisfaction  according  to  its  nature.  It  seeks  the 
good  of  others,  because  the  good  of  others  is  the  means  of  its 


LABOR   AND    ASSOCIATION.  4*71 

own  satisfactioTi,  and  is  as  really  selfish  in  its  piinciple  as  any- 
other  of  our  sentiments  ;  for  there  is  a  broad  distinction  between 
the  sentiment  of  philanthropy,  and  the  duty  of  doing  good  to 
others, — between  seeking  the  good  of  others  from  sentiment, 
and  seeking  it  in  obedience  to  a  law  which  binds  the  conscience. 
The  measure  of  the  capacity  of  philanthropy,  as  a  sentiment,  is 
the  amount  of  satisfaction  it  can  bring  to  the  possessor.  So 
long  as,  upon  the  whole,  he  finds  it  more  delightful  to  play  the 
philanthropist  than  the  miser,  for  instance,  he  will  do  it,  but  no 
longer.  Hence,  philanthropy  must  always  decrease  just  in  pro- 
portion to  the  increase  of  the  repugnances  it  must  encounter, 
and  fail  us  just  at  the  moment  when  it  is  most  needed,  and 
always  in  proportion  as  it  is  needed.  It  follows  the  law  so  ob- 
servable in  all  human  society,  and  helps  most  when  and  where 
its  help  is  least  needed.  Here  is  the  condemnation  of  every 
scheme,  however  plausible  it  may  look,  that  in  any  degree  de- 
pends on  philanthropy  for  its  success.  ,* 

The  principle  the  Associationists  want  for  their  success  is  not 
philanthropy, — the  love  of  man  for  man's  sake, — but  divine 
charity,  not  to  be  had  and  preserved  out  of  the  Catholic  Church. 
Charity  is,  in  relation  to  its  subject,  a  supernaturally  infused  vir- 
tue ;  in  relation  to  its  object,  the  supreme  and  exclusive  love  of 
God  for  his  own  sake,  and  man  for  the  sake  of  God.  He  who  has 
it  is  proof  against  all  trials ;  for  his  love  does  not  depend  on  man, 
who  so  often  proves  himself  totally  unamiable  and  unworthy, 
but  on  God,  who  is  always  and  everywhere  infinitely  amiable  and 
deserving  of  all  love.  He  visits  the  sick,  the  prisoner,  the  poor, 
for  it  is  God  whom  he  visits ;  he  clasps  with  tenderness  the  lep- 
rous to  his  bosom,  and  kisses  his  sores,  for  it  is  God  he  embraces 
and  whose  dear  wounds  he  kisses.  The  most  painful  and  dis- 
gusting offices  are  sweet  and  easy,  because  he  performs  them 
fpr  God,  who  is  love,  and  whose  love  inflames  his  heart.  When- 
ever there  is  a  service  to  be  rendered  to  one  of  God's  little  ones, 
he  runs  with  eagerness  to  do  it ;  for  it  is  a  service  to  be  render- 
ed to  God  himself.  "Charity  never  faileth."  It  is  proof 
against  all  natural  repugnances ;  it  overcomes  earth  and  hell ; 


4^2  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

and  brings  God  down  to  tabernacle  with  men.  Dear  to  it  is 
this  poor  beggar,  for  it  sees  in  him  only  our  Lord  who  had 
"  not  where  to  lay  his  head  ; "  dear  are  the  sorrowing  and  the 
afflicted,  for  it  sees  in  them  Him  who  was  "  a  man  of  sorrows 
and  acquainted  with  infirmity ; "  dear  are  these  poor  outcasts, 
for  in  them  it  beholds  Him  who  was  "  scorned  and  rejected  of 
men;"  dear  are  the  wronged,  the  oppressed,  the  down-trod- 
den, for  in  them  it  beholds  the  Innocent  One  nailed  to  the 
Cross,  and  dying  to  atone  for  human  wickedness.  And  it  joys 
to  succour  them  all;  for  in  so  doing,  it  makes  reparation  to 
God  for  the  poverty,  sufferings,  wrongs,  contempt,  and  igno- 
minious death  which  he  endured  for  our  sakes ;  or  it  is  his 
povert}^  it  relieves  in  relieving  the  poor,  his  hunger  it  feeds  in 
feeding  the  hungry,  his  nakedness  it  clothes  in  throwing  its 
robe  over  the  naked,  his  afflictions  it  consoles  in  consoling 
the  sorrowing,  his  wounds  into  w^liich  it  pours  oil  and  wine 
and  which  it  binds  up.  "  Inasmuch  as  ye  did  it  unto  the 
least  of  these  my  brethren,  ye  did  it  unto  me."  All  is  done  to 
and  for  God,  whom  it  loves  more  than  men,  more  than  life,  and 
more  than  heaven  itself,  if  to  love  him  and  heaven  were  not  one 
and  the  same  thing.  This  is  the  principle  you  need ;  with  this 
principle,  you  have  God  with  you  and  for  you,  and  failure  is  im- 
possible. But  with  this  principle.  Association  is,  at  best,  a  mat- 
ter of  indifference;  for  this  is  sufficient  of  itself  at  all  times, 
under  any  and  every  form  of  political,  social,  or  industrial  or- 
ganization.    He  who  has  God  can  have  nothing  more.  / 

But  our  gravest  objection  to  Associationism  is,  that  it  impli- 
cates the  justice  of  Almighty  God.  The  Associationists  tell  us 
that  their  plan  is  indispensable  to  the  fulfilment  of  our  destiny 
on  this  globe.  By  man  they  must  mean  men,  or  else  they  are 
talking  of  an  abstraction.  The  species  has  actual  existence  only 
in  individuals,  and  the  question  relates  only  to  actual  existences. 
It  is  absurd  to  suppose  that  God  cares  for  species,  and  not  for 
individuals, — for  the  ideal,  and  not  for  the  actual, — for  the 
abstract,  and  not  for  the  concrete.  When,  therefore,  the  orofan- 
ization  of  Labor  and  Association  are  proposed  as  indispensable 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  473 

to  the  fulfilraent  of  our  destiny, — when  its  friends  tell  us,  as 
they  do,  that  all  the  past  has  been  only  a  preamble  to  it,  a 
necessary  preparation  for  it,  they  tell  us  in  efifect  that  no  human 
being  has,  as  yet,  had  within  his  reach  the  means  of  fulfiling 
his  destiny.  But  it  will  not  do  to  say  this.  God  can  create  no 
being,  and  appoint  him  to  a  certain  end,  that  is,  make  it  his 
duty  to  gain  that  end,  and  not  provide  him  with  sufficient 
means  of  gaining  it,  if  he  chooses  to  avail  himself  of  them, 
without  contradicting  his  own  justice,  and  thereby  proving  him- 
self unjust.  If  there  is  a  single  individual  of  our  race  that  fails 
to  attain  his  destiny,  either  here  or  hereafter,  through  defect  of 
means,  not  through  his  own  fault,  the  blame  is  chargeable  upon 
the  Creator.  But  God  is  infinitely  just,  and  we  cannot  accuse 
him  of  injustice  without  blasphemy.  Then  the  means  of  fulfil- 
ing  his  destiny,  whether  here  or  hereafter,  must  always  be  within 
the  reach  of  every  man  ;  and  if  any  one  fails  to  fulfil  it,  he  has 
no  one  to  blame  but  himself.  Then  Association  never  has  been, 
is  not,  and  never  can  be,  necessary  for  the  fulfilment  of  our 
destiny  on  this  globe,  or  elsewhere ;  for  man,  every  man,  can 
fulfil  his  destiny,  if  he  chooses,  without  it. 

These  are  some  few  of  the  objections  which  seem  to  us 
conclusive  against  the  views  and  schemes  of  the  Associationists. 
They  by  no  means  exhaust  our  list  of  objections  ;  but  we  stop 
with  them,  because  we  regard  them  as  amply  sufficient  of 
themselves.  But  let  not  the  Associationists  imagine,  for  a 
moment,  because  we  refuse  to  go  with  them,  that  we  are  better 
satisfied  with  the  present  condition  of  our  fellow-men  than  thev 
are,  or  that  we  any  more  despair  of  its  amelioration  than  they 
do.  When  we  deserted  the  movement  party  and  took  refuge  in 
the  Church,  it  was  not  because  we  had  become  indifferent  to 
human  suffering,  or  because  we  despaired  of  solacing  it.  Never 
did  the  young  enthusiast,  the  fierce  declaimer,  the  bold  radical, 
feel  more  alive  to  every  form  of  human  suffering,  or  entertain  a 
stronger  hope  of  relie^-ing  it,  than  we  did,  when  our  kind  Mother 
was  pleased  to  receive  us  and  own  us  as  one  of  her  children. 
It  is  true,  we  did  not  embrace  the  Church  for  the  reason  that 


474  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

she  is  a  social  reformer,  for  the  reason  that  we  believed  her 
capable  of  eftecting  the  good  we  had  attempted,  or  which  our 
friends  were  attempting  without  her.  In  view  of  what  she 
promises  her  faithful  and  obedient  children,  all  that  we  or  they 
contemplated  is  not  worth  a  moment's  consideration.  Never- 
theless, she  furnishes  in  abundance  all  the  means  necessary  to 
remove  all  real  evils,  and  to  secure  every  possible  good. 

Let  not  the  Associationists  misapprehend  us.  We  do  not 
ask  them  to  embrace  the  Church,  because  she  is  the  proper 
agent  for  acquiring  the  good  they  seek  for  their  fellow  men  ;  for 
we  wish  them  to  embrace  her  from  higher  and  worthier  motives. 
For  ourselves,  w^e  have  been,  and  are  even  now,  loalh  to  dwell 
on  what  the  Church  can  do  for  us  in  this  life,  lest  we  should  be'* 
interpreted  as  assigning  false  motives  for  yielding  her  the 
homage  which  is  her  due.  We  are  unwilling  to  pursue  a  line 
of  argument,  which,  however  proper  it  may  be  in  itself,  ig- 
norance or  malice  may  torture  even  into  the  appearance  of 
placing  time  before  eternity,  society  before  heaven,  or  man 
before  or  in  competition  with  God.  The  Church  must  be 
embraced  for  a  heavenly  motive,  or  no  advantage  inures  to  us 
from  embracing  her.  She  is  here  to  prepare  us  for  heaven,  and 
heaven  is  the  only  end  that  we  can  legitimately  seek.  The  good 
she  effects  for  this  world  is  incidental,  and  should  never  be  made 
the  motive  for  becoming  or  remaining  a  Catholic.  But,  bearing 
this  always  in  mind,  we  may  without  impropriety  show  that 
she  can  do  enough  for  us,  even  in  this  world,  to  satisfy  all 
reasonable  men. 

Some  of  the  Associationists  are  already  looking  towards  the 
Church,  apparently  despairing  of  success  in  their  enterprise 
without  her ;  but  they  are  looking  to  her,  we  fear,  rather  with 
the  wish  to  obtain  her  sanction  for  their  plan,  and  her  assistance 
to  carry  it  out,  than  with  any  sincere  disposition  to  submit  them- 
selves to  her  direction  and  discipline.  If  she  will  accept  Fou- 
rierism,  they  are  ready  to  accept  her.  But  she  will  make  no 
such  aofreement  with  them.  She  will  be  all,  or  she  will  be 
nothing.     They  must  accept  her  unconditionally,  or  she  will  not 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  475 

accept  tliera.     She  has  her  own  method,  and  will  not  learn  of 
them  ;  they  must  leajn  of  her. 

But  is  her  method  adequate  ?  Let  us  see.  The  men  who 
have  manifested,  under  their  highest  forms,  the  virtues  which 
are  required  to  remove  all  real  evils  and  to  procure  every  true 
good  of  which  men  in  this  world  are  capable,  are  undeniably  to 
be  found  in  the  Catholic  Church,  and  nowhere  else.  If  all  men 
were  hke,  for  instance,  St.  Raymond  of  Pennafort,  St.  John  of 
God,  St.  Vincent  de  Paul,  or  even  Fenelon,  a  great  and  good 
man,  yet  far  below  the  standard  of  a  Catholic  Saint,  there  could 
and  would  be  no  lack  of  the  good  desirable,  and  no  real  evil 
could  exist.  There  is  not  a  form  of  evil  in  society,  a  single  ill 
«  that  flesh  is  heir  to,  which  some  one  or  more  of  our  saints  have 
not  made  provision  for  removing  or  solacing,  and  which  they 
would  not  have  removed  or  solaced,  if  they  had  been  duly 
seconded,  as  you  must  know,  if  you  have  made  youi-selves  but 
passably  acquainted  with  the  charitable  institutions  of  the 
Church.  Yet  these  saints  did  not  go  out  of  the  Church,  and 
did  but  come  up  to  that  standard  of  perfection  which  she  propo- 
ses to  all,  and  exhorts  all  her  children  to  aspire  to,  and  to 
which  all  may  attain,  by  the  grace  of  God,  and  that,  too, 
without  any  change  of  the  existing  political,  social,  or  indus- 
trial order.  All  may  have,  in  the  bosom  of  the  Church 
whatever  the  external  order,  all  the  means  needed  for  attaining 
to  the  highest  perfection  of  w^hich  they  are  capable  ;  and  by 
attaining  to  that  perfection,  all  is  secured  that  is  or  can  be 
desired  for  society. 

But  you  say,  all  are  not  saints.  True  ;  but  whose  is  the  fault  ? 
It  is  not  the  fault  of  the  politicfil,  social,  or  industrial  order, 
otherwise,  these  of  whom  we  speak  could  not  have  become  saints ; 
not  the  fault  of  the  Church,  for  she  proffers  to  all  the  same 
means  and  assistance  she  extended  to  these ;  nor  precisely  the 
fault  of  human  nature,  for  these  were  no  better  by  nature  than 
others  ;  and  many  of  the  saints  have  even  been  wild  and  dissolute 
in  their  youth.  All  may  not  be  called  by  Almighty  God  to  the 
same  degree  of  heroic  sanctity,  nor  is  it  necessary ;  but  all  are 


4*76  LABOR   AND    ASSOCIATION. 

called  to  Christian  perfection,  and  the  means  which  have  proved 
effectual  in  the  case  of  those  who  have  attained  to  it  are  extend- 
ed to  all,  and  must  needs  be,  if  adopted,  equall}^  effectual  in  the 
case  of  all.  The  fault,  whenever  any  one  falls  below  the  stand- 
ard of  perfection,  is  his  own,  is  in  the  fact  that  he  refuses  to 
comply  with  all  the  Church  commands  and  counsels.  The 
Church  cannot  take  away  free  will ;  and  as  long  as  men  retain 
it,  they  will,  to  a  greater  or  less  extent,  abuse  it.  Do  the 
Associationists  propose  to  take  it  away,  and  reduce  men  to  mere 
machines  ?  We  do  not  understand  them  to  propose  any  such 
thing ;  and  if  they  should,  it  would  be  an  additional  objection 
to  their  scheme.  God  himself  respects  our  free  will,  and  governs 
us  only  according  to  our  choice.  He  gives  us,  naturally  or 
supernaturally,  the  ability  to  will  and  to  do  as  he  wills,  and 
motives  sweet  and  attractive  as  heaven  and  terrible  as  hell  to 
induce  us  to  will  as  he  wills;  but  he  does  not  will  for  us  ;  the 
will  must  be  our  own  act.  If  the  Church  proposes  perfection 
to  all,  exhorts  all  to  aspire  to  it,  furnishes  them  all  the  assistance 
they  need  to  gain  it,  and  urges  them  by  all  the  motives  which 
can  weigh  with  them  to  accept  and  use  them,  the  fault,  if  they 
do  not,  is  theirs,  not  hers,  and  she  is  not  to  be  accused  either 
of  inefficiency  or  of  insufficiency ;  for  she  does  all  that,  in  the 
nature  of  the  case,  it  is  possible  to  do. 

But  even  a  far  lower  standard  of  Christian  worth  than  we 
have  been  speaking  of,  and  which  is  possible  in  the  bosom  of 
the  Church  to  all,  will  suffice  for  the  purpose  of  the  Associa- 
tionists. Suppose  every  one  should  do,  not  all  the  Church 
counsels,  but  simply  what  she  commands,  enjoins,  as  of  precept, 
and  which  every  one  must  d©,  or  fiill  under  her  censure,  what 
real  evil  could  remain,  or  what  desirable  sociable  good  would  be 
wanting  ?  There  would  be  no  wars,  no  internal  disorders,  no 
wrongs,  no  outrages,  no  frauds,  or  deceptions,  and  no  taking  the 
advantage  one  of  another.  There  would  be  no  unrelieved 
poverty,  no  permanent  want  of  the  necessaries  or  even  comforts 
of  life ;  for  the  Church  makes  almsgiving  a  precept,  and  com- 
mands all  her  children  to  remember  the  poor.     There  would 


LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION.  477 

remain  no  ruinous  competition  ;  for  no  one  would  set  a  liigli 
value  upon  the  goods  of  this  world.  The  real  cause  of  all  the 
social  and  industrial  evils  the  Associationists  deplore,  so  far  as 
evils  they  are,  is  coveteousness,  which  is  said  to  be  the  root  of 
all  evil ;  and  coveteousness  the  Church  condemns  as  a  mortal 
sin.  Eradicate  coveteousness  from  the  heart,  and  your  reform, 
so  far  as  desirable,  is  effected ;  and  it  is  eradicated,  or  held  in 
subjection,  by  every  obedient  Catholic.  Hence,  all  that  is  needed 
is  in  the  Church ;  let  every  one  submit  to  her  and  follow  her 
directions  ;  nothing  more  will  be  wanting.  All  can  submit  to 
her ;  for  God,  in  one  way  or  another,  gives  to  every  one  sufficient 
grace  for  that,  if  it  be  not  voluntarily  resisted ;  and  she  herself 
is  the  medium  through  which  is  communicated  all  the  strennrth 
any  one  needs  to  do  all  she  commands.  The  way  to  destroy 
the  tree  of  evil  is,  to  lay  the  axe  at  the  root ;  and  this  the 
Church  does.  She  seeks  always  to  purify  the  heart,  out  of 
which  are  the  issues  of  life,  and  she  never  fails  to  do  it  in  the 
case  of  any  one  who  submits  himself  to  her  discipline. 

But,  you  reply,  there  are  evils  in  Cathohc  countries,  and  the 
result  promised  is  as  far  from  being  attained  there  as  elsewhere. 
This  is  too  strongly  expressed.  There  are  evils  in  Catholic 
countries,  but  they  are  fewer  and  of  a  more  mitigated  character 
than  in  other  countries,  and,  moreover,  diminish  always  in 
proportion  as  the  country  is  more  truly  Catholic  and  more 
exclusively  under  Cathohc  influence.  This  is  evident  by 
contrasting  Italy  with  England,  Protestant  England  with  Cath- 
olic England,  or  Spain  and  Portugal,  as  they  now  are,  with 
what  they  were,  when  thoroughly  Catholic,  before  they  were 
prostrated  by  the  prevalence  of  revolutionary  and  infidel  ideas. 
M.  Briancourt  virtually  admits  as  much,  when  he  contrasts  the 
present  state  of  things  with  that  which  formerly  existed,  before 
infidel  governments,  philosophers,  and  reformers  had  detached 
modern  society  from  the  control  of  the  Church.  Besides,  all 
in  Catholic  countries  are  not  good  Catholics;  and  the  evils 
complained  of  undeniably  spring  from  the  acts  of  those  who 
do  not  faithfully  comply  with  the  requirements  of  the  Church. 


478  LABOR    AND    ASSOCIATION. 

If  all  complied,  tlie  evils  would  be  removed.  The  Churcli  is  to 
be  tested,  not  by  the  effects  of  non-compliance,  but  by  the  effects 
of  compliance.  She  is  answerable  only  for  those  who  comply 
with  her  demands  and  follow  her  directions.  She  cannot  force 
men  against  their  will  to  comply  ;  and  you  would  be  among  the 
first  to  cry  out  against  her  tyranny,  were  she  even  to  attempt  it. 
The  objection  implied  in  the  existence  of  evils  in  Catholic 
countries  is,  therefore,  of  no  weight.  Men  who  reject  the 
Church,  or  refuse  to  obey  her,  must  not  complain  that  she  does 
not  make  all  men  good  Catholics. 

/The  Church,  then,  offers  an  easy  and  effectual  method  of 
removing  all  real  evils,  and  of  securing  all  that  is  really  good  in 
relation  even  to  our  present  existence.  She  offers  a  feasible  and 
an  effectual  w^ay  of  serving  our  fellow-men, — of  acquiring  and 
of  giving  practical  effect  to  the  most  unbounded  charity. 
Submit  to  the  Church,  follow  her  directions,  and  you  will  need 
nothing  more.  You  can  secure  all  you  desire,  so  far  as  wise  in 
your  desires,  whatever  be  the  form  of  the  government  or  the 
social  or  industrial  order  under  which  you  live.  The  internal 
can  be  rectified  in  every  state  and  condition  of  life ;  and  when 
the  internal  is  right,  you  need  have  no  fears  for  the  external. ;, 
This  is  a  speedy  way,  and  within  the  power  of  each  individual, 
without  his  being  obliged  to  wait  for  the  cooperation  of  his 
brethren ;  for  each  can  individually  submit  himself  at  any  mo- 
ment he  chooses.  It  is  an  effectual  way  ;  for  the  reliance  is  not 
on  human  weakness  and  instability,  but  on  the  infinite  and 
unchangeable  God. 

Let  not  our  friends  scorn  this  way,  because  it  is  old,  simple, 
and  easy.  God's  ways  are  not  ours.  David,  to  slay  the  giant, 
chose  a  simple  sling  and  a  smooth  stone  from  the  brook,  not  the 
armor  and  sword  of  the  king.  The  prophet  bade  the  Syrian 
simply,  "Go  wash  and  be  clean."  God's  ways  are  always 
foolishness  to  human  pride  and  human  prudence ;  but  whoso 
enters  them  finds  them  leading  to  life.  Let  not  our  friends 
scorn  this  way  through  pride.  Others  as  learned,  as  philo- 
sophic, as  high  in  station,  as  proud  as  they,  and   who  once 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  479 

looked  upon  it  with  as  much  distrust  and  contempt  as  they  can, 
have,  through  grace,  entered  it ;  and  they  have  found  "  hidden 
riches  "  which  they  did  not  look  for,  and  which  make  all  that 
is  promised  from  Association,  multiplied  a  thousand  times  into 
itself,  appear  poor,  mean,  and  despicable. 


SOCIALISM   AND   THE    CHURCH.* 

JANUARY,    1849. 

This  handsomely  printed  volume,  has  been  sent  us  "  from 
the  author,"  and  we  can  do  no  less  than  acknowledge  its  recep- 
tion. It  is  filled  with  the  wild  speculations  and  demoralizing 
theories  hardly  to  be  expected  from  "  a  Woman."  In  a  literary 
point  of  view,  it  is  beneath  ci'iticism,  but  it  bears  the  marks  of 
some  reading,  and  even  of  hard,  though  ill-directed,  thinking. 
Nature  has  treated  the  author  liberally,  and  she  will  have  much 
to  answer  for.  The  work  could  have  proceeded  only  from  a 
strong  mind  and  a  corrupt  heart. 

The  work  itself  pertains  to  the  Socialistic  school,  and,  substan- 
tially, to  the  Fourieristic  section  of  that  school.  According  to 
it,  the  human  race  began  its  career  in  ignorance  and  weakness, 
and  establish  a  false  system  of  civilization.  Modern  society, 
dating  from  the  fall  of  the  Western  Roman  empire,  has  been 
engaged  in  a  continual  struggle  to  throw  oflf  that  system,  and  to 
establish  a  true  system  in  its  place.  It  has  been  engaged,  thus 
far,  in  the  work  of  demolition,  which  it  has  finally  terminated. 
It  has  prepared  the  ground  for  true  civilization,  and  the  human 
race  now  stand  waiting,  or  did  stand  waiting  on  the  first  of 

*  England  the  Civilizer ;  her  History  developed  in  its  Principles; 
with  Reference  to  the  Civilizational  History  of  Modern  Europe, 
(America  inclusive),  and  with  a  View  to  the  Denouement  of  the  Diffi- 
culties of  the  Hour.  By  a  Woman.  London.  Simpkins,  Marshall,  & 
Co.     January,  184S.     12mo.     pp.  470. 


480  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

January,  1848,  the  signal  to  introduce  it,  and  to  put  an  end  for 
ever  to  all  evils,  moral,  social,  and  physical. 

The  old  civilization,  now  effete,  committed  the  capital  error 
of  recognizing  religion, — in  the  language  of  the  author,  super- 
stition^— government,  property,  and  "  the  ascendency  of  the 
male  sex,"  or  family, — for  the  family  cannot  subsist  without 
that  ascendency ; — the  new  civilization  will  correct  this  eri-or, 
and  for  religion  substitute  science  ;  for  government,  federation  ; 
for  law,  instinct ;  for  property,  communal  wealth ;  for  family, 
love ;  and  for  the  ascendency  of  the  male  sex,  the  administra- 
tion of  women.  Consequently,  the  new  civilization  is  to  be  a 
petticoat  civilization,  in  which  we  must  include  the  human  race 
in  those  genera  which  are  named  after  the  female,  as  cows, 
geese,  ducks,  hens,  &c. 

Into  the  details  of  this  new  civilization,  or  the  means  by 
which  it  is  to  be  introduced  and  preserved,  we  need  not  enter. 
Some  things  may  be  assumed  to  be  settled ;  if  not,  the  human 
race  can  settle  nothing,  and  it  is  idle  to  examine  the  claims  of  a 
new  theory.  If  any  thing  can  be  settled,  it  is  that  the  man  is 
the  head  of  the  woman, — that  she  is  for  him,  not  he  for  her ; 
and  that  religion,  government,  family,  property,  are  essential 
elements  of  all  civilization.  Without  them  man  must  sink  be- 
low the  savage,  for  in  the  lowest  savage  state  we  find,  at  least, 
some  reminiscences  of  them.  Any  system  whicK  proposes  their 
abolition  or  essential  modification  is  by  that  fiict  alone  condemn- 
ed, and  proved  to  deserve  no  examination.  We  do  the  Social- 
ists too  much  honor  when  we  consent  to  hear  and  refute  their 
dreams.  We  have  not  at  this  late  day  to  resettle  the  basis  of 
society,  to  seek  for  unknown  truth  in  religion  or  politics,  in  re- 
lation to  pubHc  or  domestic,  private  or  social  life ;  we  have  no 
new  discoveries  to  make,  no  important  changes  to  introduce  ; 
and  all  that  we  need  attempt  is  to  acertain  the  truth  which  has 
been  known  from  the  beginning,  and  to  conform  ourselves  to  it. 

Nevertheless,  the  work  before  us  is  a  pregnant  sign  of  the 
times,  and  may  afford  food  for  much  useful  reflection  to  those 
prepared  to  digest  it.     People  who  attend  to  their  own  business, 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  481 

tread  the  routine  their  fathers  trod,  and  atteni[)t  to  discharge  in 
peace  and  quiet  the  practical  duties  of  their  state,  Httle  suspect 
what  is  fermenting  in  the  heated  brains  of  this  nineteenth  cen- 
tury. They  know  next  to  nothing  of  what  is  going  on  around 
thera.  They  look  upon  the  doctrines  contained  in  works  hke 
the  one  before  us  as  the  speculations  of  a  few  insane  dreamers, 
and  are  sure  that  the  good  sense  of  mankind  will  prevent  them 
from  spreading,  and  confine  their  mischief  to  the  misguided 
individuals  who  put  them  forth.  They  regard  them  as  too  ri- 
diculous, as  too  absurd,  to  be  believed.  They  can  do  no  harm, 
and  we  need  not  trouble  our  heads  about  them.  This  is  certain- 
y  a  plausible  view  of  the  subject,  but,  unhappily,  there  is  noth- 
ing too  ridiculous  or  too  absurd  to  be  believed,  if  demanded  by 
the  dominant  spirit  or  sentiment  of  an  age  or  country  ;  for  what 
is  seen  to  be  demanded  by  that  spirit  or  sentiment  never  ap- 
pears ridiculous  or  absurd  to  those  who  are  under  its  influence. 
Nothing,  to  a  rightly  instructed  mind,  is  more  ridiculous  or 
absurd  than  the  infidelity  which  so  extensively  prevailed  in  the 
last  century,  and  which  under  another  form  prevails  equally  in 
this.  Yet  when  the  philosophy  which  necessarily  implied  it 
first  made  its  appearance,  few  comparatively  took  the  alarm, 
and  even  learned  and  sound  Churchmen  were  unable  to  per- 
suade themselves  that  there  was  any  serious  danger  to  be  ap- 
prehended. When  the  philosophers  and  literary  men  went 
farther,  and,  developing  that  philosophy,  actually  made  free  with 
the  Scriptures,  and  even  the  mysteries  of  iixith,  the  majority  of 
those  w^ho  should  have  seen  what  was  coming  paid  little  atten- 
tion to  them,  jested  at  the  incipient  incredulity  with  great  good 
humor,  felt  sure  that  no  considerable  number  of  persons  would 
proceed  so  far  as  to  deny  not  only  the  Church,  but  the  very 
existence  of  God,  and  flattered  themselves  that  the  infidelity 
which  was  manifest  would  prove  only  a  temporary  feshion,  a 
momentary  caprice,  which  would  soon  become  weary  of  itself, 
and  evaporate.  Nevertheless,  all  the  while,  the  age  was  virtu- 
ally infidel,  and  thousands  of  those  who  had  persisted  in  believ- 
ing there  was  no  danger  were  themselves  but  shortly  after  driven 


482  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

into  exile,  or  brought  to  the  guillotine  by  its  representatives. 
The  same  thing  occurs  now  in  regard  to  Socialism.  The  great 
body  of  those  who  have  faith  and  sound  principles  look  upon  it 
as  the  dream  of  a  few  isolated  individuals,  as  undeservino-  a 
moment's  attention,  and  think  it  a  waste  of  time  and  breath 
even  to  caution  the  public  against  it.  Yet  in  one  form  or  other 
it  has  already  taken  possession  of  the  age,  has  armed  itself  for 
battle,  made  the  streets  of  Paris,  Berlin,  Frankfort,  Vienna,  and 
other  cities,  run  with  blood,  and  convulsed  nearly  the  whole 
civilized  world.  It  is  organized  all  through  Europe  and  the 
United  States ;  scarcely  a  book,  a  tract,  or  a  newspaper  is  issued 
from  a  constantly  teeming  press,  that  does  not  favor  it.  and 
there  is  scarcely  any  thing  else  going  that  can  raise  a  shout  of 
applause  from  the  people ;  and  yet  we  ai'e  told,  even  by  grave 
men,  that  is  a  matter  which  need  excite  no  apprehension. 

Nor  is  this  the  worst  aspect  of  the  case.  Not  a  few  of  those 
who  shrink  with  horror  from  Socialism,  as  drawn  out  and  set 
forth  by  its  avowed  advocates,  do  themselves,  unconsciously, 
adopt  and  defend  the  very  principles  of  which  it  is  only  the 
logical  development;  nay,  not  only  adopt  and  defend  those 
princi})les,  but  denounce,  as  behind  their  age,  as  the  enemies  of 
the  people,  those  who  call  them  in  question.  Have  we  not  ov- 
selves  been  so  denounced  ?  If  you  doubt  it,  read  the  criticisms 
of  The  Boston  Pilot  on  our  review  of  Padre  Ventura's  Oration, 
or  The  Neio  York  Comive^rial  Advertiser^  notice  of  our  cen- 
sure of  the  Italian  Liberals  for  their  persecution  of  the  Jesuits. 
Of  course,  these  papers  have  no  authority  of  their  own,  but 
they  echo  public  opinion,  and  tell,  as  well  as  straws  which  way 
the  wind  blows.  If  the  public  condemned  in  no  measured 
terms  the  "  horrible  doctrines  "  we  a  few  years  since  put  forth 
in  an  Essay  on  the  Laboring  Classes,  it  has  not  condemned,  but 
through  some  of  its  leading  organs  commended,  an  article  on 
The  Distribution  of  FrojiertT/,  published  in  The  North  Ameri- 
can Review  for  July,  1848,  the  most  conservative  penodical, 
exccfit  our  own,  in  the  country, — which  defends  at  length,  and 
with  more  ability  than  we  ordinarily  expect  in  that  Journal,  the 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  483 

very  principles  from  which  we  logically  derive  them.  ^AYe  hold 
now  in  utter  detestation  the  doctrines  of  the  Essay^ referred  to 
and  which  raised  a  terrible  clamor  against  lis  throughout  the 
country ;  but  we  proved,  in  our  defence,  and  no  one  has  yet,  to 
our  knowledge,  ventured  to  maintain  the  contrary,  that  those 
doctrin*rs  were  only  legitimate  conclusions  from  the  Protestant 
and  democratic  premises  held  by  the  great  body  of  our  country- 
men, and  by  what  they  do  and  must  regard  as  the  more  en- 
lightened portion  of  mankind.  In  fact,  a  very  common  objec- 
tion to  us  was,  that  we  were  ahead  of  the  age,  that  is,  drew  the 
conclusions  before  the  people  were  ready  to  receive  them.  ^Ye 
did  but  reason  logically  from  the  principles  w^e  had  imbibed 
from  public  opinion,  from  general  literature,  and  the  practical 
teachings  of  those  we  had  been  accustomed  from  our  childhood 
to  hear  mentioned  with  honor,  and  had  been  required  to  revere, 
— principles,  which  we  had  never  heard  questioned,  and  never 
thought  of  questioning,  till  we  undertook  to  explain  to  our- 
selves the  universal  outcry  which  had  been  raised  against  us. 
As  we  found  our  countrymen  saying  two  and  two,  we  thought 
we  might  innocently  add,  two  and  two  make  four,  and  complete 
the  proposition.  We  were  wrong,  not  in  our  logic,  but  in  our 
principles.  We  had  trusted  the  age ;  we  had  confided  in  its 
maxims,  and  received  them  as  axioms.  As  the  mists  cleared 
away,  as  the  gloss  of  novelty  wore  off,  and  the  excitement  of 
self-defence  subsided,  we  sav/  the  horrible  nature  of  the  doc- 
trines we  had  put  forth,  and  recoiled,  not  only  from  them,  but 
from  the  principles  of  which  they  were  the  necessary  logical 
development.  But  the  age  has  not  followed  our  example.  The 
great  body  of  the  people  continue  to  adhere  to  those  principles, 
and  will  not  suffer  them  to  be  questioned,  j 

No  doubt,  the  majority  of  numbers  are  as  yet  unprepared  to 
adopt  Socialism  as  developed  by  Owen,  Fourier,  Saint-Siraon, 
Cabet,  Proudhon,  or  by  "  xi  Woman  "  in  the  work  before  us ; 
but  no  man  who  ha.s  studied  the  age  can,  if  he  have  any  toler- 
able powers  of  generalization,  doubt  that  Socialistic  principles 
jire  those  now  all  but  universally  adopted.     They  are  at  the  bot- 


484 


SOCIALISM    AND   THE    CHURCH. 


torn  of  nearl}^  all  hearts,  and  at  work  in  nearly  all  minds ;  and 
just  in  proportion  as  men  acquire  courage  enough  to  say  not 
only  two  and  two,  two  and  two,  but  that  two  and  two  make 
four^  the  age  rushes  to  their  practical  realization, — accepts  their 
logical  developments,  however  horrible,  however  impious.  There 
is  an  invincible  logic  in  society  which  pushes  it  to  the  realization 
of  the  last  consequences  of  its  principles.  In  vain  do  moderate 
men  cry  out  against  carrying  matters  to  extremes ;  in  vain  do 
practical  men  appeal  to  common  sense  ;  in  vain  do  brave  men 
rush  before  the  movement  and  with  their  bodies  attempt  to 
intei'pose  a  barrier  to  its  onward  progress.  Society  no  more 
— nay,  less — than  individuals  recoils  from  the  conclusions  which 
follow  logically  from  premises  it  holds  to  be  sound  and  well 
established.  It  draws  practically  those  conclusions,  with  a 
terrible  earnestness,  and  a  despotism  that  scorns  every  limita- 
tion. On  it  moves,  heedless  of  what  or  of  whom  it  may  crush 
beneath  the  wheels  of  its  ponderous  car.  Woe  to  him  who 
seeks  to  stay  its  movement !  Social  evils  grow  as  it  advances, 
and  these  it  lays  to  the  charge  of  those  who  would  hold  it 
back,  and  result,  it  maintains,  only  from  the  foct  that  it  has  not 
yet  reached  its  goal.  The  reform  is  not  carried  far  enough. 
Put  on  more  steam,  carry  it  farther,  carry  it  farther,  is  the  loud 
cry  it  raises. 

We  see  this  in  the  Protestant  Reformation.  The  Reformers 
did  not  fulfil  their  promises,  did  not  secure  to  the  people  the 
good  they  had  led  them  to  expect.  Everybody  saw  this,  every- 
body felt  it ;  for  everybody  found  himself  distracted  and  unsatis- 
fied. What  was  the  inference  drawn  ?  That  the  Reformers 
bad  erred  in  principle,  and  that  the  Reformation  could  not  se- 
cure the  good  promised?  By  no  means.  The  people  had 
accepted  its  principle.  The  Reform,  said  they,  is  good,  is  just 
and  true ;  but  it  has  not  been  carried  far  enough  ;  the  Reform- 
ers were  only  half  reformed ;  they  stopped  short  of  the  mark. 
The  Reform  must  not  stop  with  Luther  and  Calvin ;  we  must 
carry  it  farther.  This  is  what  the  children  of  the  Reformation 
said,  as  we  all  know ;  and  they  have  been  from  the  first  strug- 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  485 

gling  to  cany  it  flxrther  and  farther,  and  have  at  length  cari'ied 
it  to  the  borders,  if  not  into  the  regions,  of  nihihty.  The  evils 
remain,  nay,  eveiy  day  increase,  and  each  day  a  new  pavty 
rises  up  in  the  bosom  of  the  most  advanced  sect,  and  demands 
a  further  advance. 

In  the  political  world  we  see  the  same  thing.  Revolution  has 
followed  revolution,  and  no  political  reform  goes  far  enough  to 
satisfy  its  friends.  In  the  last  century,  revolutions  were  politi- 
cal, and  had  for  their  object  the  establishment  of  political  equal- 
ity, or  democracy.  It  was  soon  seen  that  political  equality 
answers  no  purpose  where  there  is  social  inequality.  A  writer, 
who  could  sjDeak  with  as  much  authoiity  on  this  subject  as  any 
of  our  contemporaries,  thus  expressed  himself  in  1841 : — 

"  But  democracy  as  a  form  of  government,  2-olitical  democ- 
racy, as  we  call  it,  could  not  be  the  terra  of  popular  as])iration. 
Regarded  in  itself,  without  reference  to  any  thing  ulterior,  it  is 
no  better  than  the  aristocratic  form  of  government,  or  even  the 
monarchical.  Universal  suffrage  and  eligibilit}^  the  expression 
of  perfect  equality  before  the  state,  and  which  with  us  are  nearly 
realized,  unless  viewed  as  means  to  an  end,  are  not  worth  con- 
tending for.  What  avails  it,  that  all  men  are  equal  before  the 
state,  if  they  must  stop  there  ?  If  under  a  democracy,  aside 
from  mere  pohtics,  men  may  be  as  unequal  in  their  social  condi- 
tion as  under  other  forms  of  government,  wherein  consists  the 
boasted  advantages  of  your  democracy  ?  Is  all  possible  good 
summed  up  in  suffrage  and  eligibiUty  ?  Is  the  millennium 
realized,  when  every  man  may  vote  and  be  voted  for  ?*  Yet  this 
is  all  that  political  democracy,  reduced  to  its  simplest  elements, 
proposes.  Political  democracy,  then,  can  never  satisfy  the  pop- 
ular mind.  This  democracy  is  only  one  step — a  necessary  step 
— in  its  progress.  Having  realized  equality  before  the  state, 
the  popular  mind  passes  naturally  to  equahty  before  society.  It 
seeks  and  accepts  ^ooUtical  democracy  only  as  a  means  to  social 
democracy  ;  and  it  cannot  fail  to  attempt  to  realize  equality  in 
men's  social  condition,  when  it  has  once  realized  equality  in 
their  political  condition." — The  Boston  Quarterly  Review,  Jan- 
uary, 1841,  pp.  113,  114. 

PoUtical  democracy  leaves  the  principal  social  evils  unredress* 


486  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

ed,  and  the  causes  which  led  the  reform  thus  far  remain  in  all 
their  force  to  carr}^  it  still  farther.  Hence  we  see  in  the  present 
century  the  same  party  which  in  the  last  demanded  political 
democracy  attempting  throughout  nearly  the  whole  civilized 
world  a  series  of  revolutions  in  favor  of  social  democracy.  The 
leaders  in  the  late  French  Revolution  tell  you  that  it  was  a  so- 
cial re^'olution  they  sought,  and  that  it  was  this  fiict  which  dis- 
tinguished it  from  the  Revolution  of  1*789.  In  Italy  and  Ger 
many  two  revolutions  are  going  on  at  once,  a  political  revolu- 
tion and  a  social  revolution.  Young  Italy  is  socialistic ;  so  is 
Young  Germany ;  and  it  was  its  socialistic  character  that  gave 
to  the  movement  of  Ronge  and  his  associates  its  significance 
and  its  moderate  success.  The  race,  modern  philosophers  tell 
us,  is  progressive,  and  in  a  certain  sense  we  concede  it.  It 
tends  invariably  to  reach  the  end  imjilied  in  the  principles  it 
adopts  or  the  impulse  it  has  received,  and  that  tendency  is  never 
self-arrested.  Its  progress  towards  that  end  is  irresistible  ;  and 
when  it  happens  to  be  downward,  as  at  present,  if.  is  fearfully 
rapid,  and  becomes  more  fearfully  rapid  in  proportion  to  the  dis- 
tance it  decends. 

The  only  possible  remedy  is,  not  declamation  against  the  hor- 
rible results,  the  pernicious  conclusions,  at  which  the  popular 
mind  arrives, — the  resource  of  weak  men, — but  the  correction 
of  the  popular  premises  and  recalling  the  people  to  sound  first 
principles.  Once  concede  that  even  political  equality  is  a  good, 
an  object  worth  seeking,  you  must  concede  that  social  equality 
is  also  a  good ;  and  social  equality  is  necessarily  the  annihila- 
tion of  religion,  government,  property,  and  family.  The  same 
principle  which  would  justify  tu?  Moderate  Republicans  of 
France  in  dethroning  the  king  w^ould  justify  M.  Proudhon  in 
making  war  on  property,  declaring  every  rich  man  a  robber,  and 
seeking  to  exterminate  the  bourgeoisie^  as  these  have  already 
exterminated  the  nobility.  There  is  no  stopping-place  between 
legitimacy — whether  monarchical  or  republican  legitimacy — 
and  the  most  ultra  Socialism.  Once  in  the  career  of  political 
reform, — we  say  political,  not  administrative,  reform, — we  are 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  487 

pleclji:ed  to  pursue  it  to  its  last  results.  We  are  miserable 
cowards,  or  worse,  if  we  shrink  from  the  legitimate  deductions 
from  our  own  premises.  There  is  not  a  meaner  sin  than  the  sin 
of  inconsequence, — a  sin  against  our  own  rational  nature  which 
distinguishes  us  from  the  mere  animal  world.  If  we  adopt  the 
Socialistic  premises,  we  must  go  on  with  the  Socialists  in  their 
career  of  destruction ;  nay,  we  shall  be  compelled  to  do  so,  or 
strew  the  battle-field  with  our  dead  bodies.  If  we  recoil  from 
the  Socialistic  conclusions,  T^'e  must  reexamine  our  own  premises, 
and  reject  distinctly,  unreservedly,  and  heroically  every  Social- 
istic principle  we  may  have  unwittingly  adopted,  every  Social- 
istic tendency  we  may  have  unintentionally  cherished. 

The  people,  it  is  well  known,  do  not  discriminate,  do  not  per- 
ceive, until  h  is  too  late,  the  real  nature  and  tendency  of  their 
principles.  They  mix  up  truth  and  ftilseliood,  and  can  hardly 
ever  be  made  to  distinguish  the  one  from  the  other.  They 
adopt  principles  which  appear  to  them  sound  and  wholesome, 
and  which  under  a  certain  aspect  are  so,  and,  unconscious  of 
aiming  at  what  is  destructive,  they  place  no  confidence  in  any 
who  tell  them  they  expose  themselves  to  danger.  They  see  no 
connection  between  their  principles  and  the  conclusions  against 
which  we  warn  them,  and  w-hich  they  at  present,  as  well  as  we, 
perhaps  view  with  horror;'  they  therefore  conclude  that  the  con- 
nection we  assert  is  purely  imaginary,  that  we  ourselves  are  de- 
ceived, or  have  some  sinister  purpose  in  asserting  it ;  that  we 
are  wedded  to  the  past,  in  love  with  old  abuses,  because,  per- 
haps, we  profit,  or  hope  to  profit,  by  them  ;  that  we  do  not  un- 
derstand our  age,  are  narrow^  and  contracted  in  our  views,  with 
no  love  or  respect  for  the  poorest  and  most  numerous  class. 
In  a  word,  they  set  us  down  as  rank  conservatives  or  aristocrats. 
No  age  ever  comprehends  itself,  and  the  people,  following  its 
dominant  spirit,  can  never  give  an  account  of  their  own  princi- 
ples. They  never  trace  them  out  to  their  last  results,  and  are 
unable  to  follow  the  chain  of  reasoning  by  which  horrible  con- 
sequences are  linked  to  premises  which  appear  to  them  innocent. 
They  never  see  whither  they  are  going.     Democratic  philoso- 


488  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

phers  themselves  tell  us  as  much,  and  defend  their  doctrine  on 
the  ground  that  the  people  are  directed  by  divine  instincts  and 
obey  a  wisdom  which  is  not  their  own.  To  this  effect  we  may 
quote  the  writer  already  cited,  and  who,  on  this  point,  was 
among  the  more  moderate  of  his  class.  In  an  article  on  Phil- 
osoijluj  and  Common  Sense,  which  had  the  honor  to  be  com- 
mended by  Victor  Cousin,  he  says  : — 

"  Philosophy  is  not  needed  by  the  masses ;  but  they  who 
separate  themselves  from  tlie  masses,  and  who  believe  that  the 
masses  are  entirely  dependent  on  them  for  truth  and  virtue,  need 
it,  in  order  to  bring  them  back  and  bind  them  again  to  univer- 
sal Humanity.  And  they  need  it  now,  and  in  this  country, 
]>orhaps,  as  much  as  ever.  The  world  is  filled  with  commotions. 
The  massess  are  heaving  and  rolling,  like  a  mighty  river,  swollen 
with  recent  rains,  and  snows  dissolving  on  the  mountains, 
onward  to  a  distant  and  unknown  ocean.  There  are  those 
among  us,  who  stand  awe-struck,  who  stand  amazed.  What 
means  this  heaving  and  onward  rolling  ?  Whither  tend  these 
miglUy  masses  of  human  beings  ?  Will  they  sweep  away  every 
fixture,  every  house  and  barn,  every  mark  of  civilization  ?  Where 
will  they  end  ?  In  what  will  they  end  ?  Shall  w^e  rush  before 
th(-ni  and  attempt  to  stay  their  progress  ?  Or  shall  we  fall  into 
their  ranks  and  on  with  them  to  their  goal?  'Fall  into  their 
ranks  ;  be  not  afraid  ;  be  not  startled  ;  a  divine  instinct  guides 
and  moves  onward  that  heaving  and  rolling  mass  ;  and  law- 
less and^  destructive  as  it  may  seem  to  you,  ye  onlookers,  it  is 
normal  and  holy,  pursuing  a  straight  and  harmless  direction  on 
to  the  union  of  Man  with  God.'  So  answers  philosophy,  and  this 
is  its  glory.  The  friends  of  Humanity  need  philosophy,  as  the 
means  of  legitimating  the  cause  of  the  j^eople,  of  proving  that 
it  is  the  right,  and  the  duty,  of  every  man  to  bind  himself  to 
that  cause,  and  to  maintain  it  in  good  report  and  in  evil  report, 
in  life  and  in  death.  They  need  it,  that  they  may  prove  to 
these  conservatives,  who  are  fjightened  almost  out  of  their  wits 
at  the  movements  of  the  masses,  and  who  are  denouncing  them 
in  no  measured  terms,  that  these  movements  are  from  God,  and 
that  they  who  war  against  them  are  warring  against  truth,  duty, 
God,  and  Humanity.  They  need  it,  that  they  may  no  longer 
be  obliged  to  make  apologies  for  their  devotion  to  the  masses, 
their  democratic  sympathies  and  tendencies.  They  who  are 
persecuted  for  rigliteousness'  sake,  who  are  loaded  with  reproach 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  489 

for  their  fidelity  to  truth  and  duty,  who  are  all  but  cast  out  of 
the  pale  of  Humanity,  because  they  see,  love,  and  pursue 
Humanity's  true  interests, — they  need  it,  that  they  may 
comprehend  the  cause  of  the  opposition  they  meet,  forgive 
their  enemies,  silence  the  gainsayer,  and  give  to  him  that 
asks  it  a  reason  for  the  hope  that  is  in  them.  The  friends  of 
progress,  here  and  everywhere,  need  it,  that,  having  vindicated, 
legitimated  progress,  as  philosophers,  they  may  go  into  the 
saloons,  the  universities,  the  halls  of  legislation,  the  pulpit,  and 
abroad  among  the  people,  and  preach  it,  with  the  dignity  and 
the  authority  of  the  prophet." — The  Boston  Quarterly  Review, 
January,  1838,  pp.  104,  105. 

It  is  necessary  to  take  this  ground,  or  give  up  democracy, 
which  Mr.  Bancroft  defines  "  Eternal  Justice  ruhng  through  the 
people,"  as  wholly  indefensible  ;  for  it  cannot  be  denied  that 
popular  movements  are  blind,  and  that  in  them  the  people  are 
borne  onward  whither  they  see  not,  and  by  a  force  they  com- 
prehend not.  Hence  it  is  easy  to  understand,  that,  retaining  in 
their  memories  traces  of  former  instructions,  they  may  recoil 
with  horror  from  the  last  consequences  of  Socialism,  and  yet  be 
intent  only  on  developing  Socialistic  tendencies,  and  crushing 
all  opposition  to  them. 

I  Socialism  is,  moreover,  presented  in  a  form  admirably  adapted 
to  deceive  the  people,  and  to  secure  their  support.  It  comes  in 
Christian  guise,  and  seeks  to  express  itself  in  the  language  of 
the  Gospel.  Men  whom  this  age  delights  to  honor  have  called 
our  blessed  Lord  "  the  Father  of  Democracy,"  and  not  few  or 
insignificant  are  those  who  tell  us  that  he  was  "  the  first  Social- 
ist." In  this  country,  the  late  Dr.  Channing  took  the  lead  in 
reducing  the  Gospel  to  Socialism  ;  land  in  France,  the  now  fallen 
Abbe  de  la  Mennais,  condemned  by  Gregory  the  Sixteenth,  of 
immortal  memory,  was  the  first,  w^e  believe,  who  labored  to 
establish  the  identity  of  Socialism  and  Christianity./'  We  gave 
in  another  place,  in  1840,  a  brief  notice  of  his  views  on  this 
point,  which  it  may  not  be  uninstructive  to  reproduce : 

"  The  most  remai'kable  feature  in  the  Abbe  de  la  Mennais's 
doctiine  of  liberty  is  its  connection  with  religion.      It  is  well 


490  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

known,  that  for  some  time  the  friends  of  freedom  in  Europe 
have  been  opposed  to  the  Church,  and  in  general  to  all  religion. 
The  privileged  orders  have  also  taken  great  pains  to  make  it 
widel}'  believed,  that  religion  requires  the  support  of  existing 
abuses,  and  that  no  one  can  contend  for  social  meliorations 
without  falling  into  infidelity.  This  has  created  a  false  issue, 
one  which  M.  de  la  Mennais  rejects.  He  has  endeavored,  and 
with  signal  success,  to  show  that  there  is  no  discrepancy  between 
religion  and  liberty;  nay,  more,  that  Christianity  offers  a  solid 
foundation  for  the  broadest  freedom,  and  that,  in  order  to  be 
true  to  its  spirit,  its  friends  must  labor  with  all  their  might  to 
restore  to  the  people  their  rights,  and  to  correct  all  social  abuses. 
He  proves  that  all  men  are  equal  before  God,  and  therefore 
equal  one  to  another.  All  men  have  one  Father,  and  are 
therefore  brethren,  and  ought  to  treat  one  another  as  brothers. 
This  is  the  Christian  law.  This  law  is  violated,  whenever 
distinction  of  races  is  recognized  ;  whenever  one  man  is  clothed 
with  authority  over  his  equals  ;  whenever  one  man,  or  a  num- 
ber of  men,  are  invested  with  certain  privileges,  which  arc  not 
shared  equally  by  the  whole.  As  this  is  the  case  everywhere, 
everywhere  therefore  is  the  Christian  law  violated.  Everywhere 
therefore  is  there  suffering,  lamentation.  The  people  every- 
where groan  and  travail  in  pain,  sighing  to  be  delivered  from 
their  bondage  into  the  glorious  liberty  of  the  sons  of  God.  To 
this  deliverance  the  people  have  a  right.  For  it  every  Chris- 
tian should  contend ;  and  they  wrong  their  brethren,  deny 
Christianity,  and  blaspheme  God,  who  oppose  it. 

"This  is  a  new  doctrine  in  France.  It  is  something  new 
since  the  days  of  the  philosophes,  to  undertake  to  show  that 
Christianity  is  the  religion  which  favors  not  kings  and  privileged 
orders,  but  the  people,  the  poor  and  needy,  the  wronged  and 
downtrodden.  Hitherto  the  few  have  made  the  many  submit 
to  the  grievous  burdens  under  which  they  groaned,  by  represent-, 
ing  it  as  irreligious  to  attempt  to  remove  them.  They  have 
enlisted  the  clergy  on  their  side,  and  made  religion,  the  very 
essence  of  which  is  justice  and  love,  contribute  to  the  support 
of  opj)ression.  They  have  deterred  the  pious  from  seeking  to 
better  their  condition,  by  denouncing  all  who  seek  the  meliora- 
tion of  society  as  infidels.  But  the  Abbe  has  put  a  stop  to  this 
unhallowed  proceeding.  He  has  nobly  vindicated  religion  and 
the  people.  He  has  turned  the  tables  upon  the  people's  masters, 
and  denounced  their  masters,  not  the  people,  as  infidels.  He 
has  enlisted  religion  on  the  side  of  freedom  ;  recalled  that  long 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  491 

forgotten  Gospel,  which  was  glad  tidings  to  the  poor,  and  dared 
follow  the  example  of  Jesus,  whom  the  common  people  heard 
gladly,  and  whom  the  people's  masters  crucified  between  two 
thieves.  He  speaks  out  for  freedom,  the  broadest  freedom,  not 
in  the  tones  of  the  infidel  scoflfer,  but  in  the  name  of  God, 
Christ,  and  man,  and  with  the  authority  of  a  prophet.  His 
'  Words  of  a  Believer '  has  had  no  parallel  since  the  days  of 
Jeremiah.  It  is  at  once  a  prophecy,  a  curse,  a  hymn,  fraught 
with  deep,  terrible,  and  joyful  meaning.  It  is  the  doom  of  the 
tyrant,  and  the  jubilee-shout  of  the  oppressed.  We  know  of 
no  work  in  which  the  true  spirit  of  Christianity  is  more  faith- 
fully represented.  It  proclaims,  '  Blessed  are  the  poor,  for  theirs 
is  the  kingdom  of  heaven ;'  and  woe  unto  the  rich  oppressor, 
the  royal  spoiler,  the  Scribes  and  Pharisees,  hypocrites,  who 
bind  heavy  burdens  and  lay  them  on  men's  shoulders,  while 
they  themselves  will  not  move  them  with  one  of  their  fingers." 
— The  Boston  Quarterly  Review^  January,  1840,  pp.  117,  119. 

It  may  not  be  amiss  to  place  by  the  side  of  this  bold  com- 
mendation of  the  Words  of  a  Believer,  the  judgment  pronounced 
upon  that  book  and  its  doctrines  by  the  Sovereign  Pontiff,  in 
his  Encyclical  Letter,  dated  June,  1834,  which  we  find  in  the 
Pieces  Justificatives^  published  by  M.  de  la  Mennais  at  the  end 
of  his  volume  entitled,  Affaires  de  Rome,  Braxelles,  1837  : 

"  Horruimus  sane,  venerabiles  Fratres,  vel  ex  primo  oculorum 
obtutn,  auctorisque  ca^citatem  miserati  intelleximus,  quonam 
scientia  prorumpat,  quae  non  secundum  Deum  sit,  sed  secundum 
mundi  elementa.  Enimvero  contra  fidem  sua  ilia  declaratione 
solemniter  datam,  captiosissimis  ipse  ut  plurimum  verborum, 
fictionnmque  involucris  oppugnandam,  evertendamque  suscepit 
catholicam  doctrinam,  quam  memoratis  nostris  litteris,*  tum  de 
debita  erga  potestates  subjectione,  tum  de  arcenda  a  populis 
exiliosa  imlifferentismi  contagione,  deque  frenis  injiciendis  eva- 
ganti  opinionum  sermoiiumque  licentice,  tum  demum  de  dam- 
nanda  omnimodo  consci entire  libertate,  teterrimaque  societatum, 
vel  ex  cujuscuraque  falsae  religionis  cultoribus,  in  sacrae  et 
publicae  rei  perniciem  conflatarum  conspiratione,  pro  auctoritate 
hurailitati  nostrae  tradita  definivimus, 

"Refugit  sane  animus  ea  perlegere,  quibus  ibidem  auctor 
vinculum   quodlibet    fidehtatis   subjectionisque   erga   principes 

*  Epistola  Encyclica,  August  15,  1832. 


492  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

disruinpere  conatiir,  fece  undeqiiaque  perduellionis  immissa, 
qua  public!  ordinis  clades  inagistratuiim  contemptus,  legum 
infractio  grassetiir,  omniaque,  et  sacrae,  et  civilis  potestatis  ele- 
menta  convellantur.  Ilinc  novo  et  iniquo  commento  potestatem 
principum,  veluti  divinai  legi  infestam,  imo  02ms  peccati  et  Sa- 
tance  'potestatem  in  caiumnioe  portentnm  traducit,  prresidibusque 
sacrorum  easdem,  ac  imperantibus  turpitudinis  iiotas  iniirit  ob 
criminum  inolilionumque  foedus,  quo  eos  somniat  inter  se  ad  ver- 
sus populorum  jura  coHJunctos.  Neque  tanto  hoc  ausu  contentus 
oranigenam  insuper  opiiiionum,  sernionura,  conscientiseque  liber- 
tatem  obtrudit  niilitibusque  ad  earn  a  tyrannide,  ut  ait,  liberaii- 
dam  diinicaturis  fausta  omnia  ac  felicia  comprecatur,  coetus  ac 
consociationes  fui'iali  aestu  ex  universo  qua  patet  Orbe  advocat, 
et  in  tarn  nefaria  consilia  urgens  atque  instans  compeliit,  ut  eo 
etiam  ex  capite  monita  prasscriptaque  nostra  proculcata  ab  ipso 
sentiamus. 

"  Piget  cuncta  hie  recensere,  quse  pessimo  hoc  impietatis  et 
audaciae  foetu  ad  divina  Immanaque  omnia  perturbanda  conge- 
runtur.  Sed  illud  praesertim  indignationem  excitat,  religionique 
plane  intolerandum  est,  divinas  pnescriptiones  tantis  erroribus 
adserendis  ab  auctore  afterri,  et  incautis  venditari,  euraque  ad 
populos  lege  obedientioe  solvendos,  perinde  ac  si  a  Deo  missus 
et  iiispiratus  esset,  postquam  in  sacratissimo  Trinitatis  augustae 
nomine  proefatus  est,  Sacras  Sci'ipturas  ubique  obtendere,  ipsa- 
rumque  verba,  qua3  verba  Dei  sunt,  ad  prava  hujuscemodi  deli- 
ramentainculcanda  callide  audacterque  detorquere,  quo  fidentius, 
uti  inquiebat  S.  Bernardus,  ;;?*o  luce  tenehras-  offandat^  et  pro 
mclle  vel  potius  in  melle  vencmun  prophiet^  novum  cudens  popu- 
lis  EvangeUum^  aUudque2'>onensfundamentum2^rceter  id  quod 
positum  est. 

"  Veriim  tantam  lianc  san?e  doctrinae  illatam  pernieiem  silen- 
tio  dissimulare  ab  eo  vetamur,  qui  speculatores  nos  ])osuit  in 
Israel,  ut  de  errore  illos  moneamus,  quos  Auctor  et  consumma- 
tor  fidei  Jesus  nostr^e  curie  concredidit. 

"  Quare  auditis  nonnuUis  ex  venerabilibus  fratribus  nostris  S. 
R.  E.  cardinalibus,  motu  proprio,  et  ex  certa  scientia,  deque  Apos- 
tolicae  ])otestatIs  plenitudine  memoratum  librum,  cui  tituliis  :  Fa- 
roles  d'un  Cro7/ant,  quo  per  impium  Verbi  Dei  abusum  populi 
corrumpuntnr  ad  omnis  ordinis  publici  vincula  dissolveda,  ad 
utramque  auctoritatem,  labefactandam,  ad  seditiones  in  imperiis, 
tumultus,  re))ollionesque  excitandas,  fovendas,  roborandas,  librum 
ideo  propositiones  respective  falsas,  cnlumniosas,  temei'arias,  indu- 
centes  in  anarchiam,  cuntrarias  Verbo  Dei,  impias,  scandalosas, 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  493 

erroneas  jam  ab  Ecclesia  prsesertim  in  Valdensibus,  Wiclefitis, 
Hussitis,  'aliisqiie  id  generis  hsereticis  damnatas  continentera, 
reprobaniiis,  damnamus,  ac  pro  reprobato  et  damnato  in  perpe- 
Unim  liaberi  vohimus,  atque  decernimus. 

"  Vestrum  nunc  erit,  venerabiles  Fratres,  nostris  liisce  mandatis, 
quce  rei  et  sacree  et  civilis  salus  et  incoluraitas,  necessario  efflagitat, 
omni  contentioni  obsecundare,  ne  scriptum  istius  modi  e  latebris  ad 
exitium  emissum  eo  iiat  perniciosius,  quo  magis  vesanse  no\itatis 
libidini  velificatur,  et  late  ut  cancer  serpit  in  populis.  Muneris 
vestris  sit,  urgere  sanam  de  tanto  hoc  negotio  doctrinam,  vafri- 
tiamque  novatorum  patefacere,  acriusque  pro  Christiani  Gregis 
custodia  vigilare,  ut  sludium  religionis,  pietas  actionum,  pax 
publica  floreant  et  augeantur  feliciter.  Id  sane  a  vestra  fide, 
et  ab  impensa  vestra  pro  communi  bono  instantia  fidenter  ope- 
rimur,  ut,  eo  juvante  qui  pater  est  kiminum,  gratulemur  (dicimus 
cum  S.  Cy^Yiano)  fuisse  intellectum  errorem.et  retusum.et  ideo 
prostratum^  quia  agnitum^  atque  detectum.^^ — pp.  56-62. 

We  hope  the  judgment  of  the  Holy  Father  will  weigh  as 
much  with  our  readers  as  that  of  the  Editor  of  The  Boston 
Quarterly  Rcvieiu.  We  had  for  a  time  the  unenviable  honor 
of  being  ranked  ourselves  among  those  who  attempted  here  and 
elsewhere  to  translate  Christianity  into  Socialism.  There  are, 
perhaps,  yet  hving,  persons  who  remember  the  zeal  and  perse- 
verance with  which  we  preached,  in  tbe  name  of  the  Gospel, 
the  most  damnable  radicalism.  We  cite  a  few  paragraphs  from 
an  essay  entitled  Democracy  of  Christianity,  published  in  The 
Boston  Quarterly  Review,  October,  183S. 

"In  a  civil  and  political  sense,  we  cannot  discover  that  the 
Church  regards  Christianity  in  any  other  light  than  that  of  a 
curb,  a  bit,  a  restraint,  a  means  by  which  the  people  may  be  kept 
in  order  and  in  submission  to  their  masters.  The  clergy,  under 
this  point  of  view,  are  a  sort  of  constabulatory  force  at  the  ser- 
vice of  the  police,  and  meeting-houses  a  substitute  for  police 
offices,  houses  of  correction,  and  penitentiaries.  Far  be  it  from 
us  to  deny  the  great  worth  of  Christianity  in  this  respect.  We 
acknowledge  the  virtues  of  the  Church,  as  an  agent  of  the  po- 
lice ;  but  we  hope  we  may  be  allowed  to  believe  that  Christian- 
ity requires  the  "Church  to  possess  other  and  far  higher  virtues. 
It  should  not  merely  keep  the  people  in  subjection  to  an  order 
of  things  which  is,  but  fire  them  with  the  spirit  and  the  energy 


494  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

to  create  a  social  order,  to  which  it  shall  need  no  constabulatory 
force,  lay  or  clerical,  to  make  the  millions  submissive. 

"  But  if  the  Churchy  both  here  and  in  Euro2:)e,  does  not  de- 
sert the  cause  of  Absolutism,  and  make  common  cause  ivith  the 
people,  its  doom  is  sealed.  Its  union  with  the  cause  of  Liberty- 
is  the  only  thing  which  can  save  it.  The  party  of  the  people, 
the  democracy  throughout  the  civilized  world,  is  every  day  in- 
creasing in  numbers  and  in  power.  It  is  already  too  strong  to 
be  defeated.  Popes  may  issue  their  bulls  against  it ;  bishops 
may  denounce  it ;  priests  may  slander  its  apostles,  and  appeal  to 
the  superstition  of  the  multitude  ;  kings  and  nobilities  may  col- 
lect their  forces  and  bribe  or  dragoon ;  but  in  vain ;  it  is  too 
LATE.  Democracy  has  become  a  power,  and  sweeps  on  resist- 
less as  one  of  the  great  agents  of  Nature.  Absolute  monarchs 
must  be  swept  away  before  it.  They  will  fail  in  their  mad  at- 
tempt to  arrest  the  progress  of  the  peo[)le,  and  to  roll  back  the 
tide  of  civilization.  They  will  be  prostrated  in  the  dust,  and 
rise  no  more  for  ever.  Whoever  or  whatever  leagues  with  them 
must  take  their  fate.  If  the  Altar  be  supported  on  the  Throne, 
and  the  Church  joined  to  the  Palace,  both  must  fall  together. 
Would  the  Church  could  see  this  in  time  to  avert  the  sad  catas- 
trophe !  It  is  a  melancholy  thing  to  reflect  on  the  ruin  of  that 
majestic  temple  which  has  stood  so  long,  over  which  so  many 
ages  have  passed,  on  which  so  many  storms  have  beaten,  and  in 
which  so  many  human  hearts  have  found  shelter,  solace,  and 
heaven.  It  is  melancholy  to  reflect  on  the  condition  of  the  peo- 
ple deprived  of  all  forms  of  worship,  and  with  no  altar  on  which 
to  offer  the  heart's  incense  to  God  the  Father.  Yet  assuredly 
churchless,  altarless,  with  no  form  or  shadow  of  w^orship  will 
the  people  be,  if  the  Church  continue  its  league  with  Absolut- 
ism. The  people  have  sworn  deep  in  their  hearts,  that  they 
will  be  free.  They  pursue  freedom  as  a  Divinity,  and  freedom 
they  will  have, — with  the  Church  if  it  may  be,  without  the 
Church  if  it  must  be.  God  grant  that  they  who  profess  to  be 
his  especial  servants  may  be  cured  of  their  madness  in  season 
to  save  the  Altar ! 

"  The  people  almost  universally  identify  Christianity  with  the 
Church.  They  cannot  reject  the  Church  without  seeming  to 
themselves  to  be  rejecting  Christianity,  and  therefore  not  with- 
out regarding  themselves  as  infidels.  Will  the  clergy  consent 
to  drive  the  people  into  infidelity  ?  Can  they  not  discern  the 
signs  of  the  times  ?  Will  they  persist  in  maintaining  social 
doctrines  more  abhorrent  to  the  awakening  instincts  of  the  peo- 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CIIUKCH.  495 

pie  than  atheism  itself?  A  people,  regarding  itself  as  infidel, 
is  in  the  worst  plight  possible  to  pursue  the  work  of  social  re- 
generation. It  is  then  deprived  of  the  hallowed  and  hallowing 
influence  and  guidance  of  the  religious  sentiment ;  and  it  can 
hardly  fail  to  become  disorderly  in  the  pursuit  of  order,  and  to 
find  license  instead  of  liberty,  and  anarchy  instead  of  a  popular 
government.  For  its  own  sake,  then,  and  for  the  sake  of  liber- 
ty also,  the  Church  should  break  its  league  with  the  despots 
and  join  with  the  people,  and  give  them  its  purifying  and  en- 
nobling influence. 

"  The  Church  must  do  thisor  die.  Already  is  it  losing  its 
hold  on  the  hearts  of  the  people.  Everywhere  is  there  com- 
plaint of  men's  want  of  interest  in  religion  ;  everywhere  is  there 
need  of  most  extraordinary  eftbrts,  and  various  and  "powerful 
machinery,  to  bring  people  into  the  Church,  and  few  are 
brought  in,  save  women  and  children.  The  pulpit  has  ceased 
to  be  a  power.  Its  voice  no  longer  charms  or  kindles.  It  finds 
no  echo  in  the  universal  heart.  Sermons  are  thought  to  be 
dull  and  vapid  ;  and  when  they  call  forth  applause,  it  is  the 
preacher  that  wins  it,  not  the  cause  he  pleads.  Are  we  at  any 
loss  to  account  for  this  ?  The  old  doctrines,  the  old  maxims, 
the  old  exhortations,  the  old  topics  of  discussion,  which  the  cler- 
gy judge  it  their  duty  to  reproduce,  are  not  those  which  now 
most  interest  the  people.  The  dominant  sentiment  of  the  peo- 
ple is  not  what  it  was.  Once  it  was  thought  that  the  earth  was 
smitten  with  a  curse  from  God,  and  happiness  was  no  more  to 
be  looked  for  on  it  than  from  it.  Then  all  thoughts  turned  to 
another  world,  and  the  chief  inquiry  was,  how  to  secure  it.  To 
save  the  soul  from  hell  hearafter  was  then  the  one  thing  need- 
ful ;  and  the  preacher,  who  could  show  how  that  was  to  be 
done  and  heaven  secured,  was  sure  to  be  listened  to.  It  is  dif- 
ferent now.  Men  think  less  of  escaping  hell,  have  less  fear  of 
the  Devil,  more  faith  in  the  possibility  of  improving  their  earth- 
ly condition,  and  are  more  in  earnest  to  extinguish  the  fires  of 
that  hell  which  has  been  burning  here  ever  since  the  fall.  The 
Church  must  conform  to  the  new  state  of  things.  She  cannot 
bring  back  the  past.  Yesterday  never  returns.  If  she  would 
have  her  voice  responded  to,  she  must  speak  in  tones  that  shall 
harmonize  with  the  dominant  sentiment  of  the  age.  She  must 
preach  democracy/,  and  then  will  she  wake  an  echo  in  every 
heart,  and  call  forth  a  response  from  the  depths  of  the  univer- 
sal soul  of  Humanity.  She  mn  speak  tvith  'poiuer  only  when 
she  speaks  to  the  dominant  sentiment^  and  command  love  and 


406  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

obedience  only  ivhen  she  commands  that  which  the  peojjle  feci, 
for  the  time  at  least,  to  be  the  one  thing  needful. 

"  In  calling  upon  the  Church,  by  which  term  we  mean  espec- 
ially the  clergy  of  all  communions,  to  associate  with  the  dem- 
ocracy, and  to  labor  for  the  realization  of  that  equality  towards 
which  the  people  are  everywhere  tending,  we  seem  to  ourselves 
to  be  merely  recalling  the  Church  to  Christianity.  We  freely 
acknowledge  the  past  services  of  the  Church.  She  has  done 
much,  and  done  nobly.  She  has  protected  the  friendless,  fed 
the  orphan,  raised  up  the  bowed-down,  and  delivered  him  who 
was  ready  to  perish.  She  has  tamed  the  ruthless  barbarian,  in- 
fused into  his  heart  the  sentiment  of  chaste  love,  and  warmed 
him  with  admiration  for  the  generous  and  hmnane  ;  she  has 
made  kings  and  potentates,  who  trample  on  their  brethren  with- 
out remorse,  and  lord  it  without  scruple  over  God's  heritage, 
feel  that  there  is  a  power  above  them,  and  that  throne  and  dia- 
dem, sceptre  and  dominion,  shall  avail  them  naught  in  presence 
of  the  King  of  kings,  before  whom  they  must  one  day  stand 
and  be  judged,  as  well  as  the  meanest  of  their  slaves ;  she  h;is 
done  a  thousand  times  over  more  good  for  the  human  race  than 
we  have  space  or  ability  to  rehite,  and  blessings  on  her  memory  ! 
eternal  gratitude  to  God  for  that  august  assembly  of  saints, 
martyrs,  and  heroes,  which  she  has  nourished  in  her  bosom,  and 
sent  forth  to  teach  the  world,  by  their  lives,  the  divinity  there 
is  in  man,  one  day  to  be  awakened  and  called  forth  in  its  infinite 
beauty  and  omnipotent  energy  ! 

"  But  while  we  say  this,  we  feel  that  the  Church  now,  in  both 
its  Catholic  and  Protestant  divisions,  is  unconscious  of  its  mis- 
sion, and  has  become  false  to  its  great  Founder.  Jesus  was, 
under  a  political  and  social  aspect,  the  prophet  of  the  democra- 
cy. He  came  to  the  poor  and  afflicted,  to  the  wronged  and  the 
outraged,  to  the  masses,  the  downtrodden  millions;  and  lie 
spoke  to  them  as  a  brother,  in  the  tones  of  an  infinite  love,  an 
infinite  compassion,  while  he  thundered  the  rebukes  of  Heaven 
against  their  oppressors.  '  Ye  serpents,  ye  generation  of  \'ii)ers,' 
says  he  to  the  people's  masters,  '  how  can  ye  escape  the  damna- 
tion of  hell  ? '  His  word  was  with  power.  Ay,  was  it,  because 
he  spoke  to  the  common  soul,  because  he  spoke  out  for  outraged 
Humanity,  and  because  he  did  not  fear  to  speak  to  the  great, 
the  renowned,  the  rich,  the  boastingly  religious,  in  terms  of  ter 
rible  plainness  and  severity.  Before  his  piercing  glance  earth 
born  distinctions  vanish,  and  kings  and  princes,  scribes  anL 
Pharisees,  chief  priests  and  elders,  sink  down  below  the  meanest 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  497 

fisherman,  or  the  vilest  slave,  and  become  less  worthy  to  enter 
the  kingdom  of  heaNen  than  publicans  and  harlots.  Their  robes 
and  widened  phylacteries,  their  loud  pretentions,  their  wealth, 
rank,  refinement,  influence,  do  not  deceive  him.  He  sees  the 
hollow  heart  within  them,  the  whited  sepulchres  they  are,  full 
of  dead  men's  bones  and  all  manner  of  uncleanness,  vessels 
merely  washed  on  the  outside,  all  filthy  within,  and  he  de- 
.nounces  them  in  terms  too  terrible  to  be  repeated.  Here  was 
the  secret  of  his  power.  The  great,  the  honored,  the  respecta- 
ble, the  aristocracy,  social  or  religious,  beheld  in  him  a  fearful 
denouncer  of  their  oppressions,  a  ruthless  imveiler  of  their  hid- 
den deformity ;  while  the  poor,  the  '  common  people,'  saw  in 
him  a  friend,  an  advocate,  a  protector,  ay,  an  avenger. 

"Jesus  declared  that  the  spirit  of  the  Lord  was  upon  him, 
because  he  was  anointed  to  preach  the  Gospel  to  the  poor ; 
and  he  gave,  when  asked  by  the  disciples  of  John,  the  foct,  that 
the  Gospel  was  preached  to  the  poor,  as  one  of  the  principal 
proofs  of  his  iSIessiahship.  He  chose  his  disciples  from  the  low- 
est ranks  of  his  countrymen  ;  and  they  were  the  common  peo- 
ple who  heard  him  gladly.  Was  he  not  a  prophet  from  God 
to  the  masses?  Was  he  a  prophet -to  them  merely  because  he 
prepared  the  way  for  their  salvation  hereafter  ?  Say  it  not. 
The  earth  he  came  to  bless  ;  on  the  earth  he  came  to  establish 
a  kingdom  ;  and  it  was  said  of  him  that  he  should  not  fail  nor 
be  discouraged  till  he  had  set  judgment, — justice, — in  the  earth 
and  the  isles  waited  for  his  law.  He  was  to  bring  forth  victory 
unto  truth.  In  his  days  the  earth  was  to  be  blest ;  under  his 
reign  all  the  nations  were  to  be  at  peace ;  the  sword  was  to  be 
beaten  into  the  ploughshare  and  the  spear  into  the  pruning-hook  ; 
and  war  was  to  be  no  more.  The  wolf  and  the  lamb  were  to 
he  down  together,  and  they  were  not  to  hurt  or  destroy  in  all 
the  holy  mountain  of  the  Lord.  The  wilderness  was  to  rejoice 
and  blossom  as  the  rose,  and  the  solitary  place  was  to  be  glad. 
Every  man  was  to  sit  under  his  oivn  vine  and  fig-tree,  with  none 
to  molest  or  to  make  afraid.  On  the  earth  was  he  to  found  a 
new  order  of  things,  to  bring  round  the  blissful  ages,  and  to 
give  to  renovated  man  a  fortaste  of  heaven.  It  was  here,  then, 
the  millions  were  to  be  blessed  with  a  heaven,  as  well  as  here- 
after." *— pp.  464-469. 

*  The  Christian  reader  will  not  fail  to  perceive  that  the  writer  here, 
in  his  blindness,  takes  precisely  the  view  which  was  taken  by  the  car- 
nal Jews,  for  which  they  were  cursed.     Truly,  there  is  nothing  new 


498  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

The  general  doctrine  asserted  in  this  last  extract  was  not 
peculiar  to  the  writer  cited.  He  was  never  remarkable  for  his 
originality.  He  was  remarkable,  if  for  any  thing,  only  for  the 
care  with  which  he  studied  the  movement  party  of  our  times, 
seized  its  great  principles,  and  abandoned  himself  to  their 
direction.  He  accepted  that  party,  and  followed  it,  with  a 
courage  and  perseverance  worthy  of  a  better  cause.  The  views 
he  put  forth  were  those  of  his  party.  They  were  not  peculiar 
to  him  then,  and  they  are  far  less  so  now.  During  the  last  ten 
or  twelve  years  they  have  made  fearful  progress,  both  at  home 
and  abroad.  Affecting  to  be  Christian,  their  advocates  invoke 
the  name  of  Jesus  and  appeal  to  the  holy  Scriptures,  the  texts 
of  which,  with  a  perverse  ingenuity,  they  accommodate  to  their 
Socialistic  purpose.  May  Almighty  God  forgive  us  the  share 
we  had  in  propagating  what  we  called  the  Democracy  of 
Christianity !  We  have  nothing  to  palliate  our  offence  or  to 
hide  our  shame  ;  for,  if  we  knew  no  better  at  the  time,  we 
might  have  known  better,  and  our  ignorance  was  culpable. 
All  we  can  say  is,  we  followed  the  dominant  sentiment  of  the 
age,  which  is  a  poor  excuse  for  one  who  professed  to  be  a  preacher 
of  the  Gospel. 

Veiling  itself  under  Christian  forms,  attempting  to  distinguish 

under  the  sun.  The  old  carnal  Jews  misinterpreted  the  prophecies; 
they  expected  in  the  Messiah  that  was  to  come  a  temporal  prince,  who 
was  to  found  a  temporal  kingdom,  for  the  temporal  happiness  of 
mankind.  They  rejected  and  crucified  our  Saviour,  because  he  did 
not  come  as  such  a  prince,  because  he  proposed  a  spiritual  kingdom, 
and  the  spiritual  welfare  of  his  subjects.  The  Christian  Socialists  do 
the  same.  They  interpret  the  promises  precisely  as  they  were  inter- 
preted by  the  carnal  Jews, — expect  from  our  Lord,  like  them,  a  tem- 
poral kingdom,  and  precisely  the  same  order  of  prosperity, — and  reject 
the  Church  as  antichristian,  precisely  because  she,  like  her  Master, 
proposes  for  her  children  the  virtues  and  happiness  of  the  spiritual 
order.  So  the  progress  of  the  age  consists  solely  in  bringing  its  mas- 
ter spirits  round  to  the  point  of  view  of  the  carnal  Jews,  to  join  with 
them  in  crucifying  their  God  between  two  thieves  !  The  sects  will 
generally  be  found  to  be  wedded  to  the  carnal  just  in  proportion  aa 
they  fancy  they  have  become  spiritual. 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  499 

between  Christianity  and  the  Church,  claiming  for  itself  the 
authority  and  immense  popularity  of  the  Gospel,  denouncing 
Christianity  in  the  name  of  Christianity,  discarding  the  Bible  in 
the  name  of  the  Bible,  and  defying  God  in  t.he  name  of  God, 
Socialism  conceals  from  the  undiscriminating  multitude  its  true 
character,  and,  appealing  to  the  dominant  sentiment  of  the  age 
and  to  some  of  our  strongest  natural  inclinations  and  passions, 
it  asserts  itself  with  terrific  power,  and  rolls  on  in  its  career  of 
devastation  and  death  with  a  force  that  human  beings,  in  them- 
selves, are  impotent  to  resist.  Men  are  assimilated  to  it  by  all 
the  power  of  their  own  nature,  and  by  all  their  reverence  for 
religion.  Their  very  faith  and  charity  are  perverted,  and  their 
noblest  sympathies  and  their  sublimest  hopes  are  made  sub- 
servient to  their  basest  passions  and  their  most  grovelling 
propensities.  Here  is  the  secret  of  the  strength  of  Socialism, 
and  here,  is  the  principal  source  of  its  danger.     . 

The  open  denial  of  Christianity  is  not  now  to  be  dreaded ; 
the  incredulity  of  the  last  century  is  now  in  bad  taste,  and  can 
work  only  under  disguise.  All  the  particular  heresies  which 
human  pride  or  human  perversity  could  invent  are  now  effete 
or  unfashionable.  Every  article  in  the  Creed  has  been  success- 
ively denied,  and  the  work  of  denial  can  go  no  farther.  The 
attempt  to  found  a  new  sect  on  the  denial  of  any  particular  arti- 
cle of  ftiith  would  now  only  cover  its  authors  with  ridicule. 
The  age  laughs  at  Protestantism,  and  scorns  sectarism.  The 
spirit  that  works  in  the  children  of  disobedience  must,  therefore, 
affect  to  be  Christian,  more  Christian  than  Christianity  itself, 
and  not  only  Christian,  but  Catholic.  It  can  manifest  itself 
now,  and  gain  friends,  only  by  acknowledging  the  Church  and 
all  Catholic  symbols,  and  substituting  for  the  divine  and  heavenly 
sense  in  which  they  have  hitherto  been  understood  a  human 
and  earthly  sense.  Hence  the  religious  character  which  Social- 
ism attempts  to  wear.  It  rejects  in  name  no  Catholic  symbol ; 
it  only  rejects  the  Catholic  sense.  If  it  finds  fault  with  the 
actual  Church,  it  is  because  she  is  not  truly  Catholic,  does  not 
understand  herself,  does  not  comprehend  the  profound  sense  of 


500  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

her  own  doctrines,  fails  to  seize  and  expound  the  true  Christian 
idea  as  it  lay  in  the  mind  of  Jesus,  and  as  this  enlightened 
age  is  prepared  to  receive  it.  The  Christian  symbol  needs  a 
new  arfd  a  more  Cathohc  interpretation,  adapted  to  our  stage 
in  universal  progress.  Where  the  old  interpretation  uses 
the  words  God,  Church,  and  Heaven,  you  must  understand 
Humanity,  Society,  and  Earth  ;  you  will  then  have  the  true 
Christian  idea,  and  bring  the  Gospel  down  to  the  order  of 
nature  and  within  the  scope  of  human  reason.  But  while  you 
put  the  human  and  earthly  sense  upon  the  old  Catholic  words, 
be  careful  and  retain  the  words  themselves.  By  taking  care  to 
do  this,  you  can  secure  the  support  of  the  adherents  of  Christian- 
ity, who,  if  they  meet  their  old  familiar  terms,  will  not  miss 
their  old,  fomiliar  ideas  ;  and  thus  you  will  be  able  to  reconcile 
the  old  Catholic  world  and  the  new,  and  to  go  on  with  Human- 
ity in  her  triumphant  progress  through  the  ages. 

Since  it  professes  to  be  Christian,  and  really  denies  the  faith. 
Socialism  is  a  heresy ;  and  since  by  its  interpretation  it  evis- 
cerates the  Catholic  system  of  its  entire  meaning,  it  is  the 
resume  of  all  the  particular  heresies  which  ever  have  been  or 
can  be.  The  ingenuity  of  men,  aided  by  the  great  Enemy  of 
souls,  can  invent  no  further  heresy.  All  possible  heresies  are 
here  summed  up  and  actualized  in  one  universal  heresy,  on 
which  the  age  is  proceeding  w^ith  all  possible  haste  to  erect  a 
counterfeit  Catholicity  for  the  reception  and  worship  of  Antichrist 
as  soon  as  he  shall  appear  in  person. 

"  Descend,"  says  De  la  ^lemiais,  "  to  the  bottom  of  things, 
and  disengage  from  the  wavering  thoughts,  vain  and  fleeting 
opinions,  accidentally  mingled  with  it,  the  powerful  principle 
which,  without  interruption,  ferments  in  the  bosom  of  society, 
and  what  find  you  but  Christianity  itself?  What  is  it  the 
people  wish,  what  is  it  they  claim,  with  a  perseverance  that 
never  tires,  and  an  ardor  that  nothing  can  damp  ?  Is  it  not  the 
abolition  of  the  reign  of  force,  in  order  to  substitute  that  of 
intelligence  and  right?  Is  it  not  the  effective  recognition  and 
social  realization  of  equality,  inseparable  from  liberty,  the  nec- 
essary condition  and  essential  form  of  which,  in  the  organiza- 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  501 

tion   of  the  state,  is  election,  the  first  basis  of  the  Christian 
commiHiity. 

"  What,  again,  do  the  people  wish  ?  What  do  they  demand  ? 
The  amelioration  of  the  lot  of  the  masses,  everywhere  so  full  of 
suffering ;  laws  for  the  protection  of  labor,  whence  may  result 
a  more  equitable  distribution  of  the  general  wealth;  that  the 
few  shall  no  longer  exercise  an  exclusive  influence  for  their  own 
profit  in  the  administration  of  the  interests  of  all;  that  a  legis- 
lation which  has  no  bounds,  the  everlasting  refuge  of  privileo-e, 
which  it  in  vain  attempts  to  disguise  under  lying  names,  shall 
no  longer,  on  every  side,  drive  the  poor  back  into  their  misery  ; 
that  the  goods,  destined  by  the  Heavenly  Father  for  all  his  chil- 
dren, shall  become  accessible  to  all;  that  human  fraternity  shall 
cease  to  be  a  mockery,  and  a  w^ord  without  meaning.  In  short, 
suscitated  by  God  to  pronounce  the  final  judgment  upon  the 
old  social  order,  they  have  summoned  it  to  appear,  and  recalling 
the  ages  which  have  crumbled  away,  they  have  said  to  it,  'I 
was  hungry,  and  ye  gave  me  not  to  eat ;  I  was  thirsty,  and  ye 
gave  me  not  to  drink ;  I  was  a  stranger,  and  ye  took  me  not 
in;  naked,  and  ye  clothed  me  not;  sick  and  in  prison,  and  ye 
did  not  visit  me.'  I  interrogate  you  on  the  law.  Respond. 
And  the  old  social  order  is  silent,  for  it  has  nothing  to  answer  ; 
and  it  raises  its  hand  against  the  people  whom  God  has  ap- 
pointed to  judge  it.  But  what  can  it  do  against  the  people, 
and  against  God?  Its  doom  is  registered  on  high,  and  it  will 
not  be  able  to  efface  it  with  the  blood  which,  for  a  brief  period, 
it  is  permitted  to  shed. 

"  We  cannot,  then,  but  recognize  in  what  is  passing  under 
our  eyes  the  action  of  the  Christian  jjrincijyle,  which,  having 
for  long  ages  presided  almost  exclusively  over  individual  life, 
seeks  now  to  produce  itself  under  a  more  general  and  perfect 
form,  to  incarnate  itself,  so  to  speak,  in  social  institutions, — the 
second  phase  of  its  development,  of  which  only  the  first  labor 
as  yet  appears.  Something  instinctive  and  irresistible  pushes 
the  people  in  this  direction.  The  few  have  taken  possession  of 
the  earth  ;  they  have  taken  possession  of  it  by  wresting  from 
all  others  even  the  smallest  part  of  the  common  heritage ;  and 
the  people  will  that  men  live  as  brothers  according  to  the 
Divine  commandment.  They  battle  for  justice  and  charity ; 
they  battle  for  the  doctrine  which  Jesus  Christ  came  to  preach 
to  the  world,  and  which  will  save  it  in  spite  of  the  powers  of 
the  world." — A  f aires  de  Rome,  pp.  319-321. 


502  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

This  is  as  artfnl  as  it  is  bold.  It  wears  a  pious  aspect,  it  has 
divine  words  on  its  lips,  and  ahnost  unction  in  its  speech.  It  is 
not  easy  for  the  unlearned  to  detect  its  fallacy,  and  the  great 
body  of  the  people  are  prepared  to  receive  it  as  Christian  truth. 
We  cannot  deny  it  without  seeming  to  them  to  be  warring 
against  the  true  interests  of  society,  and  also  against  the  Gospel 
of  our  Lord.  Never  was  heresy  more  subtle,  more  adroit,  better 
fitted  for  success.  How  skilfully  it  flatters  the  people  ?  It  is 
said,  the  saints  shall  judge  the  world.  By  the  change  of  a 
word,  the  people  are  transformed  into  saints,  and  invested  with 
the  saintly  character  and  oflice.  How  adroitly,  too,  it  appeals 
to  the  people's  envy  and  hatred  of  their  superiors,  and  to  their 
love  of  the  world,  without  shocking  their  orthodoxy  or  wound- 
ing their  piety !  Surely  Satan  has  here,  in  Socialism,  done  his 
best,  almost  outdone  himself,  and  would,  if  it  were  possible, 
deceive  the  very  elect,  so  that  no  flesh  should  be  saved. 

What  we  have  said  will  suflSce  to  show  the  subtle  and  dan- 
gerous character  of  Socialism,  and  how,  although  the  majority 
may  recoil  from  it  at  present,  if  logically  drawn  out  by  its  bolder 
and  more  consistent  advocates,  the  age  may  nevertheless  be 
really  and  thoroughly  Socialistic.  We  know  that  the  age  seeks 
with  all  its  energy,  as  the  greatest  want  of  mankind,  political 
and  social  reforms.  Of  this  there  is  and  can  be  no  doubt. 
Analyze  these  reforms  and  the  principles  and  motives  which 
lead  to  them,  which  induce  the  people  in  our  days  to  struggle 
for  them,  and  you  will  find  at  the  bottom  of  them  all  the  as- 
sumption, that  our  good  lies  in  the  natural  order,  and  is  not 
attainable  by  individual  effort.  All  we  see,  all  we  hear,  all  we 
read,  from  whatever  quarter  it  comes,  serves  to  prove  that  this 
is  the  deep  and  settled  conviction  of  the  age.  If  it  were  not', 
these  revolutions  in  France,  Italy,  Germany,  and  elsewhere, 
would  have  no  meaning,  no  principle,  no  aim,  and  would  be  as 
insignificant  as  drunken  rows  in  the  streets  of  our  cities. 

But  the  essence  of  Socialism  is  in  this  very  assumption,  that 
our  good  lies  in  the  natural  order,  and  is  unattainable  by  indi- 
vidual effort.     Socialism  bids  us  follow  nature,  instead  of  saying 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  503 

with  the  Gospel,  Resist  nature.  Placing  onr  good  in  the  natural 
order,  it  necessarily  restricts  it  to  temporal  goods,  the  only  good 
the  order  of  nature  can  give.  For  it,  then,  evil  is  to  v^-ant  tem- 
poral goods,  and  good  is  to  possess  them.  But,  in  this  sense, 
evil  is  not  remediable  or  good  attainable  by  individual  effort. 
We  depend  on  nature,  which  may  resist  us,  and  on  the  conduct 
of  others,  which  escapes  our  control.  Hence  the  necessity  of 
social  organization,  in  order  to  harmonize  the  interests  of  all 
with  the  interest  of  each,  and  to  enable  each  by  the  union  of 
all  to  compel  Nature  to  yield  him  up  the  good  she  has  in  store 
for  him.  But  all  men  are  equal  before  God,  and,  since  he  is 
just,  he  is  equal  in  regard  to  all.  Then  all  have  equal  rights, 
— an  equal  right  to  exemption  from  evil,  and  an  equal  right  to 
the  possession  of  good.  Hence  the  social  organization  must  be 
such  as  to  avert  equal  e^il  from  all,  and  to  secure  to  each  an 
equal  share  of  temporal  goods.  Here  is  Socialism  in  a  nut- 
shell, following  as  a  strictly  logical  consequence  from  the  prin- 
ciples or  assumptions  which  the  age  adopts,  and  on  which  it 
everywhere  acts.  The  systems  drawn  out  by  Owen,  Fourier, 
Saint-Simon,  Cabet,  Proudhon,  or  others,  are  mere  attempts 
to  realize  Socialism,  and  may  or  may  not  be  ridiculous  and  ab- 
surd ;  but  that  is  nothing  to  the  purpose,  if  you  concede  their 
principle.  These  men  have  done  the  best  they  could,  and  you 
have  no  right  to  censure  them,  as  long  as  you  agree  with  them 
in  principle,  unless  you  propose  something  better. 

Now  we  agree  with  De  la  Mennais,  that  Christianity  has  a 
political  and  social  character,  and  with  the  editor  of  The  Boston 
Quarterly  Review,  that  Christianity  seeks  the  good  of  man  in 
this  life  as  well  as  in  the  life  to  come.  We  say  with  all  our 
heart,  "  On  the  earth  was  he  [our  Lord]  to  found  a  new  order 
of  things,  to  bring  round  the  blissful  ages,  and  to  give  to  reno- 
vated man  a  foretaste  of  heaven.  It  was  here  the  millions  were 
to  be  blessed  with  a  heaven,  as  well  as  hearafter."  No  doubt 
of  it.  But  in  the  new  order  and  hy  it, — not  out  of  it  and  in- 
dependently of  it.  Out  of  the  new  order  and  independently  of 
it,  the  milHous  are,  to  say  the  least,  no  better  off  than  if  it  did 


"504  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

not  exist,  and  have  no  right  to  any  portion  of  its  blessings. 
The  Sociahsts,  when  they  attempt  to  press  Christianity  into 
their  service,  are  bad  logicians.  They  are  right  when  they  tell 
us  that  our  Lord  came  to  found  a  new  order  of  things,  for  he 
certainly  did  come  for  that  purpose ;  they  are  right  when  they 
tell  us  that  it  is  Christian  to  seek  a  heaven  on  earth  for  the  mil- 
lions, for  there  is  a  Christian  heaven  here  for  all  men,  if  they 
choose  to  accept  it ;  but  when  they  say  this,  they  are  bound  to 
add  that  this  heaven  is  in  the  new  order  established,  and  is  to 
be  sought  in  it,  and  by  obedience  to  its  principles.  It  is  Chris- 
tian to  seek  that  order  of  happiness  which  Christianity  proposes, 
by  the  means  it  prescribes  ;  but  to  seek  another  order  of  happi- 
ness, and  by  other  means,  is  not  therefore  necessarily  Christian, 
and  may  even  be  antichristian.  Here  is  the  point  they  over- 
look, and  which  vitiates  all  their  reasoning. 

Let  no  one  say  that  we  allege  that  man  must  forego  any  good 
while  in  this  world  in  order  to  gain  heaven  hereafter.  It  would 
be  no  great  hardship,  even  if  it  were  so ;  but  our  God  deals 
much  more  liberally  with  us,  and  requires  us  to  give  up,  in  or- 
der to  secure  heaven  hereafter,  only  what  makes  our  misery  here. 
The  Socialist  is  right  in  saying  that  there  is  good  for  us  even 
in  this  world ;  his  error  lies  in  placing  that  good  in  the  natural 
order,  and  in  making  it  unattainable  by  individual  effort.  Our 
good  lies  not  in  the  natural  order,  but  in  the  supernatural  order, 
— in  that  new  order  which  our  Lord  came  to  establish.  In  that 
order  there  is  all  the  good  we  can  conceive,  and  attainable  by 
simple  voluntary  efforts.  Out  of  that  order  there  is  no  good 
attainable  either  by  the  efforts  of  individuals  or  by  association, 
because  out  of  it  there  is  no  good  at  all.  Temporal  goods, 
giving  to  the  term  the  fullest  possible  sense,  are  not  good,  and, 
sought  for  themselves,  are  productive  only  of  evil.  Here  is  the 
first  error  of  the  Socialists.  No  evil  is  removable,  no  good  is 
attainable,  as  long  as  any  earthly  or  merely  natural  end  is  held 
to  be,  for  its  own  sake,  a  legitimate  object  of  pursuit.  There  is 
and  can  be  good  for  no  one,  here  or  hereafter,  save  in  seeking, 
exclusively^  the  end  for  which  Almighty  God  has  intended  us, 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  505 

and  by  the  means  and  in  the  way  he  himself  has  appointed. 
Now  this  end  is  neither  in  this  world  nor  of  this  world,  neither 
in  nature  nor  of  nature,  and  therefore  can  be  gained,  can  be 
promoted,  by  no  natural  effort,  by  no  natural  means, — neither 
by  political  changes  nor  by  social  changes,  neither  by  political 
democracy  nor  by  social  democracy.  These  things  have  and 
can  have  no  necessary  connection  with  it.  It  is  a  mistake,  then, 
to  regard  them,  in  themselves,  as  ever  in  any  degree  desirable. 
The  Socialists  are  right  when  they  say  that  the  Christian  law 
is  the  law  of  liberty,  but  not  therefore  necessarily  right  when 
they  term  the  movements  of  the  people  for  what  they  call 
liberty  Christian  movements,  originating  in  Christian  principle. 
Undoubtedly,  the  Christian  law  is  the  law  of  liberty.  Our 
Saviour  came  to  free  us  from  bondage,  and  whom  he  makes  free 
is  free  indeed.  In  the  order  he  establishes,  our  highest  good, 
our  only  good,  whether  for  time  or  eternity,  is  entirely  independ- 
ent of  the  world.  Nothing  in  the  universe  can  hinder  us, 
against  our  will,  from  attaining  to  it.  We  have  only  to  will  it 
and  it  is  ours,  and  we  are  always  and  everywhere  free  to  will. 
No  one  depends  on  nature  or  other  men  for  the  power  to  fulfil 
his  destiny, — to  gain  the  end  for  which  he  was  intended.  Here 
is  the  Christian  doctrine  of  liberty,  the  glorious  liberty  which 
our  rehgion  reveals,  and  which  we  know  by  divine  faith  is  no 
deception.  But  the  liberty  the  Socialists  commend,  and  which 
the  people  are  seeking,  is  not  Christian  liberty,  for  it  is  not  lib- 
erty at  all.  Socialism,  by  its  very  principle,  enslaves  us  to  nature 
and  society,  and  subjects  us  to  all  the  fluctuations  of  time  and 
sense.  According  to  it,  man  can  attain  to  true  good,  can  gain 
the  end  for  which  he  was  made,  only  in  a  certain  political  and 
social  order,  which  it  depends  on  the  millions,  whom  the  indi- 
vidual cannot  control,  to  construct,  and  which,  when  constructed, 
may  prove  to  be  inconvenient  and  inadequate,  and  require  to 
be  pulled  down  and  built  up  again.  The  individual,  it  teaches 
us,  can  make  no  advance  towards  his  destiny  but  in  proportion 
as  he  secures  the  cooperation  of  his  race.  All  men  must  be 
brought  down  or  brought  up  to  the  same  level  before  I  can  go 


606  SOCIALISM    AXD    THE    CHURCH. 

to  the  end  for  which  my  God  made  me ;  each  man's  true  good 
is  unattainable,  till  all  men  are  prepared  to  take  "  a  pull,  a 
strong  pull,  a  long  pull,  and  a  pull  altogether,"  to  attain  theirs  ! 
This  is  slavery,  not  liberty.  Nay,  it  denies  the  possibility  of  lib- 
erty, and  makes  slavery  the  necessary  condition  of  all  men.  Is  not 
he  a  slave  who  is  chained  to  nature  for  his  good,  or  to  a  social 
organization  which  does  not  exist,  and  which  depends  on  the 
wisdom,  the  folly,  the  passions  or  instincts,  the  whims  or  caprices 
of  other  men  to  create  or  to  destroy  ?  Who  can  deny  it  ?  He 
only  is  free,  he  only  knows  what  freedom  is,  who  tramples  the 
world  beneath  his  feet,  who  is  independent  of  all  the  accidents 
of  time  and  space,  of  all  created  beings,  and  who  has  but  to 
will  and  all  heaven  is  his,  and  remains  his,  though  the  entire 
universe  fall  in  ruins  around  him. 

Undoubtedly  Christianity  requires  us  to  remove  all  evil,  and 
in  seeking  to  remove  evil  we  follow  the  Christian  principle  ;  but 
what  the  Sociahsts  call  evil,  and  the  people  in  revolt  are  seeking 
to  remove,  is  not  evil.  Nothing  is  evil  but  that  which  turns 
a  man  away  from  his  end,  or  interposes  a  barrier  to  his  advance 
towards  it.  Nothing  but  one's  own  sin  can  do  that.  Nothing, 
then,  but  sin  is  or  can  be  evil,  and  that  is  evil  only  to  him  who 
commits  it.  Take  all  these  things  which  Socialists  declaim 
against, — monarchy,  aristocracy,  inequaltities  of  rank,  inequali- 
ties of  riches,  poverty,  want,  distress,  hunger,  starvation  even, — 
not  one  of  them,  in  itself  considered,  is  necessarily  evil ;  not 
one  of  them,  nor  all  of  them  combined,  can  harm  the  just  man, 
or  prevent,  except  by  his  own  will,  any  one  from  the  fulfilment 
of  his  destiny.  If  one  is  prepared  to  die,  he  may  as  well  die 
in  a  hovel  as  a  palace,  of  hunger  as  a  fever.  Nothing  can  harm 
us,  that  does  not  separate  or  tend  to  separate  us  from  God. 
Nothing  but  our  own  internal  malice  can  so  separate  us,  and  it 
is  always  in  our  power,  through  grace,  which  is  never  withheld, 
to  remove  that  at  will. 

Undoubtedly,  also,  Christianity  requires  us  to  seek  not  only 
to  remove  evil,  but  to  promote  good,  and  good  in  this  world. 
Good  is  the  object  of  the  will,  and  we  are  always  to  propose  it, 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  607 

But  the  things  the  people  in  their  insurrectionary  movements 
ai*e  seeking  after,  and  which  SociaHsts  commend,  are  not  nec- 
essarily good.  As  there  is  no  evil  to  the  just,  so  is  there  no 
good  to  the  sinner,  while  he  continues  in  his  sinful  state.  If 
the  Socialists  could  secure  to  all  men  every  thing  they  promise 
or  dream  of,  they  would  secure  them  nothing  to  their  advantage. 
Place  every  man  at  the  highest  social  level  that  you  can  con- 
ceive; give  him  the  most  finished  education  you  can  devise; 
lavish  on  him  in  profusion  this  world's  goods  ;  lodge  him  in  the 
most  splendid  palace  that  genius  can  construct,  furnished  in  the 
most  tasteful  and  luxurious  manner  ;  let  him  be  surrounded  by 
the  most  beautiful  scenes  of  nature  and  the  choicest  specimens 
of  art;  and  let  him  have  ample  leisure  and  opportunity  for 
travel,  for  social  intercourse,  and  for  the  fullest  and  most  harmo- 
nious development  of  all  his  natural  faculties  ; — you  advance 
him  not  the  milhonth  part  of  a  hair's-bi'eadth  towards  his  des- 
tiny, avert  from  him  no  evil,  secure  him  no  conceivable  good. 
It  will  be  no  consolation  to  the  damned  to  recollect,  that,  while 
here,  they  were  clothed  in  purple  and  fine  Hnen,  and  fared 
sumptuously  every  day ;  and  your  rich  men,  your  great  and 
renowned  men,  your  fine  gentlemen  and  ladies,  with  their 
polished  manners  and  fashionable  dresses,  their  soft  complexions 
and  gentle  speech,  your  accomplished  artists,  your  brilliant  poets, 
your  eloquent  orators,  your  learned  scholars,  your  profound  and 
subtile  philosophers,  as  well  as  coarse  artisans,  ragged  beggars, 
cross-grained  old  hags,  and  country  bumpkins,  will  be  damned, 
eternally  damned,  if  they  die  without  the  grace  of  God ;  and 
that  grace  is  as  likely  to  find  its  way  to  the  hovel  as  to  the 
palace,  to  dwell  beneath  the  beggar's  gabardine  as  the  embroi- 
dered mantle  of  the  rich  and  refined.  The  bulk  of  the  strong- 
minded  and  thrifty  citizens  of  this  republic,  with  all  their 
political  franchises,  social  advantages,  universities,  academies, 
common  schools,  meeting  houses,  external  decorum,  and  materi- 
al prosperity,  are  infinitely  more  destitute  than  those  Neapolitan 
lazzaroni  whose  lot  they  deplore,  and  are  in  no  rational  sense 
one  whit  better  ofif  than  the  miserable  miners  and  degraded 


508  SOCIALISM   AND    THE    CHURCH. 

populace  of  Great  Britain.  Their  possessions  will  add  nothing 
to  the  fullness  of  their  joy,  if,  by  a  miracle  of  mercy,  they  gain 
heaven,  and  will  only  render  fiercer  the  flames  of  their  torment, 
if  they  are  doomed  to  hell,  as  they  have  every  reason  to  fear 
will  be  the  case. 

The  Socialists  fall  into  the  fallacy  of  passing,  in  their  reason- 
ing, from  one  species  to  another.  Nothing  they  call  evil  is  evil ; 
nothing  they  call  good  is  good  ;  and  hence,  because  Chistianity 
commands  us  to  remove  evil  and  seek  good,  it  does  not  follow 
that  we  must  associate  with  the  disaffected  populations  to  bring 
about  political  and  social  reforms.  All  that  is  in  any  sense  good 
or  worth  having  the  individual  can  always,  under  any  political 
or  social  order,  secure  by  a  simple  eflfort  of  his  will.  Forms  of 
government  and  forms  of  social  organization,  then,  are  at  best 
indifferent ;  Socialism  is  a  folly,  and  Socicalists  fools.  The  Cre- 
ator is  good,  and  Providence  is  wise  and  just.  All  external 
events  take  place  by  the  express  appointment  of  God.  If,  then, 
a  single  event  were  evil  or  the  occasion  of  evil  to  a  single  indi- 
vidual, save  through  that  individual's  own  fault,  the  goodness 
of  the  Creator  would  be  denied,  and  the  wisdom  and  justice  of 
Providence  could  not  be  asserted.  No  doubt,  there  is  evil  in 
the  world,  far  more  heart-rending,  far  more  terrific,  than  Social- 
ists depict,  or  even  conceive ;  but  to  no  man  is  there  or  can 
there  be  evil,  but  his  own  sin,  which  is  purely  his  own  creation. 
Since  no  man  is  obliged  or  compelled  to  sin,  since  sufficient 
grace  is  given  unto  every  man  to  enable  him  to  break  off  from 
sin  and  to  become  just,  every  man  can,  as  far  as  himself  is  con- 
cerned, put  an  end  to  all  evil,  and  secure  all  good,  even  the 
supreme  Good  itself,  at  any  moment  he  pleases.  Nothing,  then, 
is  more  idle  than  to  pretend  that  political  and  social  reforms, — 
touching  the  organization  of  the  state  or  of  society,  we  mean, 
not  those  which  touch  administration — are  or  ever  can  be  nec- 
essary as  the  condition  of  averting  any  evil  or  procuring  any 
good. 

We  agree,  as  we  have  said,  that  our  Lord  came  to  found  a 
new  order  of  things, — new  in  relation  to  that  which  obtained 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  509 

among  the  heathen, — and  that  he  contemplated  the  good  of  the 
milhons  here  as  well  as  hereafter ;  we  agree,  nay,  we  hold,  that 
he  did  propose  the  amelioration  of  the  lot  of  man  even  while 
in  this  world, — and  not  of  one  class  only,  but  of  all  classes. 
But  how  ?  By  his  new  order,  or,  irrespective  of  it,  by  merely 
calling  upon  the  people  themselves  to  do  it  through  political  and 
social  organization  ?  If  you  say  the  latter,  you  place  him  in 
the  old  order,  and  class  him  with  the  old  heathen  philosophers. 
If  he  asserts  simply  man's  dependence  on  nature  and  social  or- 
ganization, he  founds  no  new  order,  for  this  dependence  was  the 
precise  basis  of  the  old  order.  Mankind  always  had  nature  and 
social  organization,  and  to  tell  them  to  look  to  these  for  their 
good  was  to  tell  them  nothing  new  ;  for  this  was  precisely  what 
they  had  done,  and  were  doing.  The  evil  which  oppressed  the 
millions  was  in  this  very  dependence,  and  what  was  needed  was 
deliverance  from  it, — some  method,  so  to  speak,  of  attaining  our 
true  good  in  spite  of  nature  and  of  social  organization.  If,  then, 
he  retains  that  dependence,  and  does  not  provide  this  method, 
what  has  he  done,  or  what  can  he  do,  which  a  heathen  philoso- 
pher might  not  have  done  ?  and  wherein  is  what  you  call  the 
Christian  order  different  from  Heathenism  ?  You  say,  he  came 
to  found  a  new  order  for  the  amelioration  of  mankind  ;  but 
how  can  you  say  this,  if  you  are  to  look  for  the  amelioration, 
which  you  say  he  authorizes  you  to  seek,  not  from  any  new 
order,  but  from  nature  and  social  organization,  which  is  precisely 
what  the  heathen  themselves  did  ? 

If  you  say,  on  the  other  hand,  as  you  must,  if  you  assert  the 
new  order  at  all,  that  our  Lord  ameliorates  the  lot  of  mankind 
by  his  new  order,  then  you  must  concede  that  it  is  only  in  and 
through  that  order  that  the  amelioration  is  to  be  effected.  Then 
you  are  to  look  for  it  only  as  you  come  into  and  conform  to  that 
order.  Now,  according  to  that  order,  the  millions  are  to  be 
blessed,  are  to  find  their  true  happiness,  not  in  following  nature, 
but  in  resisting  it, — not  in  possessing  temporal  gocds,  but  in  re- 
nouncing them,  not  in  pride  and  luxury,  but  in  humility,  pov- 
erty, and  mortification, — not  in  being   solicitous  for  what  we 


610  SOCIALISM    AND   THE    CHURCH. 

shall  eat,  or  what  we  shall  drink,  or  w^herewith  we  shall  be  cloth- 
ed, "  for  after  all  these  things  do  the  heathen  seek  "  (St.  Matt, 
vi.  31-34), — in  a  word,  not  in  seeking  anj-  of  these  thing-s,  but 
in  seeking  first,  that  is,  as  the  end  of  all  seeking,  the  kingdom 
of  God,  and  his  justice,  and  then  "  all  these  things  shall  be 
added  unto  us."  This  is  the  order  which  our  Lord  has  estab- 
lished. He  gives  us  alt  needed  grace  to  come  into  this  order 
and  to  comjDly  with  all  its  demands,  and,  if  we  come  in  and  so 
comply,  he  promises  us  all  good,  a  hundred  fold  in  this  world, 
and  everlasting  life  in  the  world  to  come. 

Now,  as  you  concede  that  our  Lord  came  to  establish  a  new 
order  of  things,  and  must  concede,  that  if  he  blesses  the  mil- 
lions at  all,  it  must  be  in  and  by  this  new  order,  you  are  bound 
to  admit  that  it  is  only  by  complying  with  its  requisitions  and 
placing  ourselves  under  its  influence,  that  our  good  in  this  world. 
as  well  as  in  the  next,  is  attainable.  Then  all  your  efforts  b}^ 
political  and  social  changes,  which  imply  a  recurrence  to  the 
old  order,  a  reliance  on  the  principles  of  the  heathen  world,  can 
only  remove  you  farther  and  farther  from  3^our  true  good. 
The  only  way  to  attain  that  good  must  be  to  begin  by  an  act  of 
renunciation,  the  renunciation  of  heathenism,  of  the  world,  of 
self,  or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  and  act  of  unconditional  sur- 
render of  ourselves  to  God.  This,  if  you  admit  Christianity  at 
all,  is  the  indispensable  condition  of  all  good.  The  heathen 
sought  their  good  from  nature  and  social  organization,  and 
found  only  evil.  AVe  are  to  seek  not  even  our  own  good,  that 
is,  for  the  simple  reason  that  it  is  our  good,  but  God  liimself, 
and  God  alone,  and  then  we  shall  find  our  good  in  Ilim  who  is 
the  sovereign  good  itself.  No  doubt,  this  complete  renuncia- 
tion of  self  is  any  thing  but  pleasing  to  self;  but  we  are  never 
required  to  do  it  in  our  own  strength.  God  always  gives  us 
grace  to  make  it  easy,  if  we  will  accept  it.  Moreover,  we  are  re- 
quired, in  this,  to  do,  at  least,  no  more  for  God  than  he  has  done 
for  us.  We  are  required  to  giA^e  up  all  for  him.  But  he  gave 
up  all  for  us.  He  made  himself  man,  took  upon  himself  the 
form  of  a  servant,  became  poor,  and  obedient  unto  death,  even 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  511 

unto  the  death  of  the  cross  for  us ;  and  can  we  not,  therefore,  give 
up  ourselves  for  him,  especially  when  what  we  give  up  it  were 
^n  injury  to  us  to  hold  back?  If  we  give  ourselves  to  him,  he 
gjves  himself  to  us.  He  can  give  no  more  than  himself,  and 
can  we  ask  or  expect  more  than  an  infinite  God  can  give  ?  Here 
is  the  condition,  and  it  is  only,  under  the  order  God  has  estab- 
lished, by  complying  with  this  condition  that  there  is  good  for 
us  here  or  hereafter ;  and  we  know,  also,  that,  by  complying,  all 
evil  is  removed,  and  all  conceivable  and  more  than  all  conceiva- 
ble good  is  obtained.  The  true  course  to  be  taken,  then,  is  per- 
fectly plain,  and  may  be  taken  without  hesitation ;  for  He  who 
has  promised  is  able  to  fulfil,  and  will  keep  his  ^^^rd. 

Of  course  we  do  not  pretend,  that,  by  conforming  to  the 
Christian  order,  the  political  and  social  equality  contended  for 
will  be  obtained ;  we  do  not  pretend  that  there  will  be  no  more 
pain,  no  more  sorrow,  no  more  poverty,  no  more  hunger  or 
thirst.  These  things  will  remain,  no  doubt,  as  facts ;  but  we 
have  shown  that  they  are  not  necessarily  evils,  and  that  their  re- 
moval is  not  necessarily  a  good.  These  things  have  their  uses  in 
this  world,  or  they  would  not  be  suffered  to  exist.  To  the  just 
they  are  mercies,  salutary  penance,  or  occasions  of  meiit, — 
purging  the  soul  from  the  stains  of  past  transgressions,  or  giv- 
ing it  an  occasion  to  rise  to  higher  sanctity  arid  a  higher  reward. 
To  the  sinner  they  may  be  the  occasion  of  evil ;  but,  if  so,  only 
because  he  does  not  receive  them  in  a  proper  disposition,  and 
because  by  his  malice  he  refuses  to  profit  by  them.  But  even 
to  him  they  are  no  more  hurtful  than  their  opposites, — often 
not  so  hurtful.  By  conforming  to  the  Christian  order,  all  so- 
called  temporal  evils,  in  so  far  as  evil,  are  removed,  and  all  so- 
called  temporal  goods,  in  so  far  as  good,  are  secured ;  and  this 
is  all  that  can  be  asked. 

But  we  are  told,  this  is  all,  no  doubt,  very  well,  very  true, 
very  pious ;  but  the  age  does  not  believe  it,  the  peo2:>le  will  not 
receive  it.  The  people  demand  political  and  social  reforms ; 
and  we  must  conform  ourselves  to  their  state  of  mind,  or  we 
can  have  no  influence  with  them.     Let  the  Church  sanction 


612  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

them  in  their  movements  for  Hberty,  equality,  and  brotherhood, 
and  then  they  will  listen  to  her  teaching,  and  profit  by  it. 

If  there  is  any  truth  in  this,  it  proves  what  we  have  all  along 
been  endeavoring  to  establish, — that  the  age  is  Socialistic,  and 
that  Socialism  is  unchristian,  nay,  antichristian.  Those,  then, 
who  urge  the  Church  to  make  an  alliance  with  the  people  in 
their  movements,  to  baptize  Socialism,  and  even  give  it  Holy 
Communion,  or  who  suppose  they  can  without  detriment  to 
religion  sympathize  with  these  movements,  we  leave  to  defend 
themselves,  as  best  they  may.  We  have  no  skill  to  frame  an 
apology  for  them,  unless  it  be  that  they  cherish  the  spirit  of  the 
age  instead  of  the  spirit  of  the  Church,  which  is  only  a  con- 
demnation, 

But  suppose  the  sanction  involved  no  violation  of  principle, 
and  suppose  the  Church  should  make  common  cause  with  the 
so-called  movement  party,  and  enable  it  to  eflfect  the  reforms  it 
attempts, — what  would  be  gained  ?  These  reforms,  if  effect(5d, 
would  content  nobody,  and  a  new  series  of  reforms  would  be 
attempted,  in  their  turn  to  be  found  equally  unsatisfactory,  and 
thus  on  in  infinitum^ — reforms  giving  birth  to  new  reforms, 
bringing  no  relief,  producing  and  perpetuating  endless  confusion, 
to  the  contentment,  the  satisfaction  of  nobody,  but  the  arch  ene- 
my of  mankind. 

The  Church  is  not  of  this  world,  and  her  principles  are  not 
those  which  govern  the  princes  or  the  people  of  this  world. 
She  is  the  Spouse  of  God  in  this  world,  the  mother  of  the 
faithful,  the  teaclier  of  truth,  and  the  dispenser  of  the  Bread  of 
Life  to  all  who  will  receive  it.  They  who  are  nursed  with  the 
milk  from  her  bosom,  who  receive  the  Bread  of  Life  from  her 
hands  and  eat  thereof,  shall  never  hunger  or  thirst,  shall  never 
die,  but  shall  live  for  ever.  All  she  asks  of  governments  and 
social  institutions  is  that  they  leave  her  free,  that  is,  violate  in 
their  administration  no  law  of  God.  If  the  people  grow  dis- 
contented with  the  matei'ial  order  they  find  existing,  she  ex- 
pounds to  them  the  law  ;  if  in  violation  of  the  law,  as  she  ex- 
pounds it,  th-^y  still  persevere,  and  introduce  a  new  order,  be 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  513 

it  T^h-dt  it  may,  she  does  not  ilesert  them ;  she  continues  to 
present  herself  in  her  divine  character  before  them,  and  to 
discharge  for  them  her  sacred  mission.  She  has  truly  a  ma- 
ternal heart,  and  seeks  always  and  every  where  the  true  good  of 
the  people  for  time  and  for  eternity ;  but  she  knows  that  Al- 
mighty God  has  made  their  good  possible  only  on  one  condi- 
tion, and  therefore  on  that  one  condition  she  must  insist.  She 
explains  it  to  the  people,  she  exhorts  and  entreats  them  with 
divine  tenderness  to  comply  with  it ;  but  if  they  regard  them- 
selves as  wiser  than  she,  refuse  to  comply  with  the  indispensa- 
ble condition  proposed,  and  will  return  to  the  old  heathen  order 
and  seek  their  good  from  nature  and  human  society,  instead  of 
seeking  it  from  God  and  his  Church,  she  grieves  over  them  as 
our  Lord  grieved  over  Jerusalem  devoted  to  destruction,  but  she 
can  do  no  more.  Their  sin  is  on  their  own  head,  and  they 
must  reap  the  fruit  of  their  own  sowing.  Themselves  they  may 
destroy, — her  they  cannot  harm. 

Here  the  discussion  of  our  subject  properly  closes ;  but  we 
fear  that  without  additional  remarks  we  may  be  misapprehended. 
These  are  times  of  jealousy,  suspicion,  and  great  uncharitable- 
ness,  when  men's  passions  are  inflamed,  and  their  heads  more 
than  ordinarily  confused.  What  we  say  on  one  subject  we  are 
in  danger  of  having  understood  of  another ;  and  because  we 
oppose  certain  popular  tendencies,  they  who  cherish  them  will 
allege  that  we  are  the  enemies  of  the  people,  opposed  to  po- 
litical and  social  amelioration,  and  solicitous  only  to  maintain 
the  reign  of  injustice  and  brute  force, — than  which  nothing  is 
or  can  be  farther  from  the  truth.  Because  we  assert  that  our 
good  lies  solely  in  the  Christian  order  and  is  always  and  every 
where  attainable  at  will,  and  therefore  deny  the  necessity  or  the 
utility  of  political  and  social  changes  as  a  means  of  bettering  our 
condition,  the  same  persons  will  endeavor  to  bring  us  into  con- 
flict with  the  Holy  Father,  who,  according  to  them,  is  a  Liberal 
Pontiff;  a  sort  of  Socialistic  Pope,  opposed  to  monarchy,  in  favor 
of  popular  institutions,  taking  the  sile  of  the  people  against 


514  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

their  rulers,  and  sanctioning  the  principle  of  their  movements, 
by  granting  a  constitutional  government  to  his  immediate  tem- 
poral subjects.  A  few  words  to  clear  up  this  matter  will  not  be 
unnecessary. 

We  have  no  occasion  to  make  a  profession  of  our  respect 
for  the  Papal  authority ;  for  our  doctrine  on  that  subject  is  well 
known.  If  that  authority  is  in  any  instance  against  us,  it  is  suf- 
ficient to  convince  us  that  we  are  wrong,  and  it  is  against  us  in 
the  present  instance,  if  the  view  given  of  Pius  the  Ninth  be  the 
just  one.  But  that  view  has  no  authority,  except  the  childish 
fears  of  one  party  and  the  unhallowed  wishes  of  another.  Pius 
the  Ninth  is  a  noble-minded  and  generous-hearted  man,  an  en- 
lightened prince,  an  humble  and  devout  Christian,  an  uncom- 
promising Catholic,  a  tender  and  vigilant  shepherd,  the  spirit- 
ual Father  of  Christendom,  the  visible  Head  of  the  Church,  the 
Vicegerent  of  God  on  earth  ;  and  he  can  be  no  Liberal,  no  So- 
cialist, no  political  and  social  reformer,  in  the  sense  of  this  age, 
— no  prince  to  deserve  the  sympathy  of  a  De  la  Mennais  or  a 
Horace  Greely,  any  more  than  of  a  Ledru  RoUin  or  a  Proud- 
hon.  We  know  beforehand  that  he  cannot  sanction  what  we 
have  presented  as  the  principles  and  motives  of  the  popular 
movements  of  the  day  ;  for  the  Church  in  General  Council 
and  through  her  Sovereign  Pontiffs  has  repeatedly  and  unequiv- 
ocally condemned  them ;  and  he  himself  has  condemned  them, 
in  condemning  Communism,  only  another  name  for  Socialism, 
and  in  enjoining  respect  and  obedience  to  princes, — as  any  one 
may  see  who  will  read  the  several  Allocutions  in  which  he  has 
explained  his  policy. 

No  man  has  been  more  grossly  misrepresented  by  pretended 
friends  and  real  enemies  than  Pius  the  Ninth.  The  admirers 
of  the  old  order, — few  in  number,  however, — alarmed  at  the 
magnitude  of  his  proposed  changes  in  the  government  and  ad- 
ministration of  his  temporal  dominions,  perhaps  offended  be- 
cause he  did  not  ask  or  follow  their  advice,  very  naturally  op- 
posed him  and  sought  to  make  him  appear  to  be  carried  away 
by  the  spirit  of  the  age,  and  pursuing  a  pohcy  which  must 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  515 

hurry  the  world  into  the  abyss  of  Radicalism ;  on  the  other 
hand,  Radicals,  SociaHsts,  Freemasons,  and  Carbonari  claimed 
him  as  one  of  themselves,  because  they  wished  to  use  the  au- 
thority of  his  name  and  position  to  stir  up  the  Catholic  popula- 
tions to  rebellion,  and  to  cover  their  own  revolutionary  and 
anarchical  purposes.  We  share  neither  in  the.  alarm  of  the 
former  nor  in  the  wish  of  the  latter.  We  form  our  judgment 
of  Pius  the  Ninth  neither  from  Greeley's  Tribune^  nor  from  the 
Roman  correspondence  of  the  London  Morning  News ;  but 
from  well  known  Catholic  principles,  his  obvious  position,  and 
his  own  official  documents.  Interpreted  by  these,  he  has  only 
followed,  with  singular  fidelity  and  firmness,  the  policy  uniform- 
ly pursued  b}''  his  predecessors. 

As  to  his  having  sanctioned  the  principles  and  motives  of  the 
popular  movements  of  the  day,  there  is  nothing  in  it.  The 
thing,  in  hac  providentia,  is  simply  impossible.  The  Church, 
it  is  certain  and  undeniable,  is  wedded  to  no  particular  form  of 
government  or  of  social  organization.  She  stakes  her  existence 
neither  on  imperialism  nor  on  feudalism,  neither  on  monarchy 
nor  on  democracy.  To  no  one  or  other  of  them  does  she  com- 
mit herself,  and  she  declares  each  of  them  to  be  a  legitimate 
form  of  government  when  and  where  it  exists  with  no  legal 
claimant  against  it.  But  the  princi^^le  of  these  movements  is 
exclusive  democracy  ; — not  that  democracy  is  a  legitimate  form 
of  government,  which  is  true  ;  not  that  in  these  times,  the 
views  of  the  age  being  what  they  are,  it  is,  with  some  restric- 
tions, the  best  form  of  government,  which  may  not  be  false ; 
but  that  the  democratic  is  the  onhj  legitimate  form  of  govern- 
ment, that  all  other  forms  are  illegitimate,  usurpations,  tyran- 
nies, to  which  the  people  owe  no  allegiance,  and  which  they 
may,  when  they  please,  or  believe  it  will  be  for  their  interest, 
conspire  to  overthrow.  This  is  the  principle  implied  in  these 
movements,  and  which  the  Liberals  pretend  that  Pius  the  Ninth 
has  sanctioned.  But  he  has  done  no  such  thing.  The  Church 
cannot  accept  this  principle,  because  it  would  bind  her  to  dem- 
ocracy, as  her  enemies  a  few  years  ago  alleged  that  she  waa 


516  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

bound  to  monarch}^,  and  compel  her  to  declare  all  other  forms 
of  government  illegal,  and  their  acts  null  and  void  from  the 
beginning.  It  would  erect  democracy  into  a  dogma  of  ftiith. 
If  the  people  now  establishing  democracies  should  hereafter  be- 
come tired  of  them,  and  wish  to  reestablish  monarchy, — not  an 
impossible  supposition, — they  would  be  obliged  to  renounce 
their  religion  before  they  could  do  it.  The  Church  could  make 
no  concession  to  them,  and  would  be  compelled  by  the  invaria- 
ble nature  of  faith,  to  command  them  to  return  to  democracy, 
on  pain  of  losing  their  souls.  She  would  then  not  only  be  her- 
self enslaved  to  democracy,  but  would  be  obliged  to  enslave  the 
people  to  it  also,  and  to  prohibit  them  under  any  circumstances 
and  in  every  country  from  ever  adopting  any  other  form,  how 
much  soever  they  might  desire  it.  Forms  of  government,  like, 
all  things  human,  are  changeable,  and  it  is  impossible  to  keep 
the  people  always  and  everywhere  satisfied  with  any  one  form. 
What  more  unreasonable  and  more  impolitic,  then,  than  to  bind 
them  by  religion  always  and  everwhere  to  one  and  the  same 
specific  form  ? 

We  are  opposing,  we  are  advocating,  no  particular  form  of 
government.  In  themselves  considered,  forms  of  goverment 
are  matters  of  indifference.  The  wise  and  just  administration  of 
government  is  always  a  matter  of  moment, — the  form,  abstract- 
ly considered,  never.  Man's  true  good  is  as  attainable  under 
one  form  of  government  or  social  organization  as  another ;  for 
it  is  obtained,  if  obtained  at  all,  from  a  source  wholly  independ- 
ent of  the  temporal  order.  That  good  the  Church  does  and 
must  seek,  and  its  necessary  condition  is  ti'ue  liberty.  To  as- 
sume, as  these  social  movements  do,  that  this  liberty  is  possible 
only  under  a  given  form  of  government  and  social  organization 
would  be  to  maintain  that  the  Church  can  discharge  her  mission 
only  where  that  particular  form  of  government  and  social  or- 
ganization exists.  The  first  thing  her  missionaries  to  a  country 
where  that  form  does  not  exist  must  attempt  would  then  be  to 
revolutionize  the  state  and  reorganize  society.  The  American 
people,  to  a  very  considerable  extent,  suppose  this  to  be  the 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  61*? 

fact ;  and,  supposing  monarchy  to  be  the  favorite  form,  main- 
tain that  the  spread  of  Cathohcity  here  must  essentially  destroy 
our  popular  form  of  government,  and  introduce  forms  similar 
to  those  which  the  people  in  the  Old  World  are  now  laboring 
to  throw  off.  Substitute  democracy  for  monarchy,  and  the 
doctrine  we  oppose  is  precisely  that  which  our  adversaries 
allege  against  us.  Are  we  to  adopt  it?  Are  we  to  believe 
that  Pius  the  Ninth  adopts  it,  and  requires  us  to  understand 
that  all  but  democratic  nations  are  out  of  the  way  of  salvation, 
placed  out  of  the  condition  of  attaining  to  any  good  here  or 
hereafter  ? 

Since  we  hold  that  forms  of  government  are  indifferent,  that 
there  is  evil  only  in  sin,  and  that  our  good  comes  exclusively 
from  the  Christian  order,  we  deny  the  necessity  of  political  and 
social  changes ;  and  since  to  seek  our  good  from  them  is  to 
seek  it  from  the  temporal  order  instead  of  the  spiritual,  which 
is  in  principle  a  rejection  of  Christianity  and  a  return  to  heath- 
enism, we  censure  them.  But  the  minds  of  the  people  may 
be  perverted  and  their  hearts  corrupted,  and  we,  in  consequence, 
unable  to  make  them  see  w^here  their  true  good  lies,  or  to 
induce  them  even  to  give  us  their  attention  while  we  point  it 
out  to  them.  They  may  be  intent  on  certain  political  changes, 
mad  for  them,  and  have  ears,  eyes,  hearts,  and  hands,  for  noth- 
ing else.  We  may  condemn  their  state  of  mind,  the  moral 
disposition  in  which  we  find  them,  but  it  is  a  fact  we  have  to 
meet,  and  deal  with  as  a  fact.  In  such  cases,  if  the  concession 
of  the  changes  demanded  involves  no  departure  from  faith  or 
morals,  it  is  wise  to  make  it,  in  some  sense,  necessary,  as  a 
means  of  removing  the  prohibens,  as  we  use  logic  with  an  unbe- 
liever in  order  to  remove  the  obstacles  he  finds  in  his  mind  to 
the  reception  of  the  faith.  When  political  or  social  changes  for 
this  purpose  become  necessary,  it  is  never  the  part  of  wisdom 
to  resist  them ;  authority  should  always  be  free  to  concede 
them ;  and  that  it  may  be  is  one  reason  why  it  cannot  and 
should  not  be  bound  to  any  particular  form  of  government  or 
social  organization. 


518  SOCIALISM    AND   THE    CHURCH. 

Pius  the  Ninth  has  evidently  acted  on  the  principle  we  here 
commend.  He  found,  on  his  accession  to  the  pontifical  throne, 
his  own  immediate  temporal  subjects  and  the  European  popula- 
tions generally  mad  for  popular  institutions,  and  not  to  be 
satisfied  with  any  thing  else.  They  were  ripe  for  revolt,  and 
pepared  to  attempt  the  acquisition  of  popular  government  in 
some  form,  at  all  hazards, — if  necessary,  by  insurrection,  violent 
and  bloody  revolution.  They  had  lost  all  respect  for  their  rulers, 
and  would  listen  no  longer  to  the  voice  of  their  pastors, — would 
listen  to  nothing  in  fact,  that  was  opposed  to  their  dominant 
passion.  What  was  to  be  done  ?  There  were  but  two  alterna- 
tives possible.  Authority  must  either  repress  them  by  the  strong 
arm  of  physical  force,  or  attempt  to  tranquillize  them  and  save 
them  from  civil  war  and  anarchy  by  the  concession  of  pop- 
ular institutions.  The  former  had  been  adopted,  had  been  tried, 
was  in  actual  operation,  and  it  alienated  still  more  and  more  the  • 
hearts  of  the  people  from  their  sovereigns,  and  from  the  Church, 
in  consequence  of  her  supposed  sympathy  with  monarchy. 
Nothing  was  left  that  could  be  tried  with  much  hope  of  a  favor- 
able issue,  but  the  latter  alternative.  Pius  the  Ninth  saw  this, 
— indeed,  most  statesmen  saw  it, — and,  anxious  for  the  peace 
and  order  of  his  dominions,  and  to  remove  from  the  minds  of 
all  whatever  accidental  obstacles  there  might  be  to  their  listen- 
ing to  the  lessons  of  religion,  he  resolved  to  adopt  it ;  and 
accordingly  proceeded  to  give  his  subjects  a  constitutional 
government,  and,  by  his  example  at  least,  recommended  to  the 
European  sovereigns  to  do  as  much  for  theirs,  and  to  do  it 
cheerfully,  ungrudgingly,  and  in  good  faith.  The  policy  came, 
indeed,  too  late  to  effect  all  the  good  that  was  hoped,  and  to 
avert  all  the  evil  that  was  threatened  ;  yet  that,  under  the  cir- 
cumstances, it  was  wise  and  prudent,  nay,  even  necessary,  there 
really  seems  to  us  no  room  to  doubt.  We  may  have  regretted 
the  circumstances  w^hich  called  for  it,  but  we  have  never  for  a 
moment  doubted,  or  thought  of  doubting,  its  wisdom  or  its  nec- 
essity, although  from  the  first  we  apprehended  the  consequences 
which  have  followed,  and  that  it  would  hasten  the  outbreak  of 


SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH.  519 

the  European  populations,  which  we  knew  the  ill-disposed  were 
preparing ;  and  we  have  never  believed  its  effect  in  pacifying 
the  excited  multitudes  would  be  as  great  as  some  of  our  friends, 
whose  confidence  in  the  people  is  greater  than  ours,  expected  it 
would  be. 

The  adoption  of  this  policy,  the  policy  of  concession  to  the 
exigencies  of  the  times,  implies  no  sanction  by  the  Holy  Father 
of  the  principles  and  motives  of  those  popular  movements  and 
demands  which  made  it  necessary  or  advisable,  nor  of  the  po- 
litical and  social  changes  we  have  spoken  against.  We  have 
been  addressing  the  people  and  endeavoring  to  show  them  what 
is  proper  for  them  to  seek,  not  attempting  to  point  out  to 
authority  what  it  should  do  ;  for  we  have  no  vocation  to  instruct 
authority  in  its  duties.  We  are  of  the  people,  and  we  only 
point  out  what  our  religion  enjoins  upon  them  and  us.  It  may 
be  very  just,  very  wise,  nay,  very  necessary,  at  times,  for  author- 
ity to  concede  what  it  is  very  wrong,  very  foolish,  on  the  part 
of  the  people  to  demand.  The  children  of  Israel,  in  the  time 
of  Samuel,  afford  us  a  case  in  point.  They  demanded  of  the 
Lord  a  king,  that  they  might  be  like  other  nations.  The  Lord 
rebuked  them,  told  them  they  knew  not  what  they  asked,  and 
unrolled  before  them  the  oppressions  to  which  a  compliance 
with  their  request  would  subject  them.  Nevertheless,  he  com- 
plied with  it,  and  gave  them  a  king.  The  question  before  Pius 
the  Ninth  was  not  the  question  we  have  been  discussing.  The 
movements  existed,  the  people  demanded  popular  institutions, 
and  were  resolved,  come  what  might,  to  attempt  them.  The 
simple  question  for  him  was,  How  shall  this  state  of  things  be 
treated  ?  He  said  to  the  princes  in  answer,  "  Give  the  people 
what  they  ask."  This  he  was  free  to  do,  because  the  Church 
is  wedded  to  no  political  or  social  order,  to  monarchy  no  more 
than  to  democracy,  is  as  independent  of  the  throne  as  of  the 
tribune,  and  can  be  as  much  at  home  in  a  republic  as  anywhere 
else. 

"^Vhat  is  to  be  the  result  of  the  movements  of  the  day  we 
know  not.     The  old  monarchies  may  be  swept  away,  or  they 


520  SOCIALISM    AND    THE    CHURCH. 

may  partially  recover,  and  linger  on  for  ages  to  come  ;  but  that 
does  not  disturb  us.  Old  Imperial  Rome  and  old  Roman  civ- 
ilization were  broken  down  by  the  irruption  of  the  Northern 
barbarians,  and  the  w^orld  was  deluged  with  barbarism,  but  the 
Church  remained  standing,  and  did  not  become  barbarian ;  the 
feudalism  of  the  Middle  Ages,  a  system,  as  somebody  has  said, 
too  perfect  for  its  time,  fell  beneath  the  combined  attacks  of 
kings  and  people,  but  the  Church  survived,  and  beheld  undis- 
mayed its  funeral  pile  ;  modern  monarchy  may  follow,  and  all 
the  world  become  democratic,  still  the  Church  will  survive,  and 
remain  in  all  her  integrity,  shorn  of  none  of  her  glory,  and 
deprived  of  none  of  her  resources.  Over  no  changes  of  this 
sort  do  we  weep.  We  have  no  fears  for  the  Church  ;  we  fear 
only  for  men.  If  we  saw  the  people  making  war  on  the  old 
political  system  in  consequence  of  its  wars  on  rehgion,  and 
straggling  for  popular  institutions  in  order  to  rescue  the  Church 
from  her  bondage,  and  to  secure  her  an  open  field  and  fair  play 
for  the  future,  we  should  hear  the  volleys  of  musketry  and  the 
roar  of  cannon,  and  witness  the  charge,  the  siege  and  sack  of 
cities,  with  tolerable  composure ;  for  then  the  war  would  be  one 
of  vengeance  on  the  old  governments  for  the  insults  they  have 
offered  to  the  Immaculate  Spouse  of  God,  and  for  the  freedom 
of  worship,  the  only  war  in  which  real  glory  ever  is  or  can  be 
acquired.  But,  alas !  we  see  nothing  of  all  this.  These  en- 
raged populations  are  moved  by  no  regard  for  religion,  they  are 
to  a  fearful  extent  the  bitter  enemies  of  religious  freedom,  and 
governed  by  a  malignant  hatred  of  the  Church.  They  are 
seeking  only  an  earthly  end,  and  they  loathe  the  Christian 
order.  Here  is  the  source  of  our  anxiety,  the  ground  of  our 
fears, — not  for  the  Church,  not  for  ourselves,  but  for  them. 
They  threaten  to  be  more  violent  enemies  to  religion  than  any 
kings  have  been  since  the  persecuting  emperors  of  Pagan 
Rome ;  and  the  conduct  of  the  Swiss  radicals,  the  imprison- 
ment of  the  noble  Bishop  of  Lausanne  and  Geneva  in  the 
Castle  of  Chillon,  and  the  persecution  of  the  children  of  St. 
Alphonsus  by  the  people  of  Vienna,  reveal  but  too  plainly  the 


SOCIALISM   AND   THE    CHURCH.  521 

spirit  which  animates  them,  and  tell  us  but  too  distinctly  what, 
at  least  for  a  time,  we  are  to  expect  from  the  triumph  of  the 
popular  party.  Nevertheless,  a  wise  and  just  Providence  rules, 
and  these  things  are  permitted  only  as  mercies  or  judgments 
upon  the  nations.  It  is  ours  to  humble  ourselves  and  adore ; 
and  always  have  we  this  consolation,  that  no  evil  can  befall  us 
against  our  will,  and  that  always  and  everywhere  may  we  secure 
every  good  by  unreserved  submission  to  God  in  his  Church. 


FINIS 


COT,-T^--T,    TT^jygp^gj^Y  LIBRARY 


or  at  the 


DUE  DATE 


Qim^  APR 


1  2  1988^ 


-^^ 


r  r-    %  ^ 


^:>Ji 


i 


3 '^(3 


^E>^^ 


S^^^^or. 


JUL  -816 


